Speak the TRUTH in LOVE

 

Ephesians 4:15“Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

This verse is SO important to us as believers today. So many times if one of us is stumbling, others around us either don’t address it at all, brushing it off, or when they do address it they sugar coat it and say, “oh everyone struggles with that”. Yes it’s good to relate, but when we leave it at ‘relating’ and don’t push or spur each other on towards Christ and towards change, then those stumbling will just be caught in the ugly cycle again and again and again. When we speak the truth in LOVE and NOT condemnation, there is respect in that, respect for the other person saying, “I love you so much that I can’t let you stay in this cycle” and I don’t know about you, but I would hope someone would do the same for me. It might sting at the moment, but I would rather someone put stinging, healing medicine on my wound rather than let it sit and leave a scar later.

Ever Interceding

Hebrews 7:25“Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

I LOVE that part….read it again, “because he ALWAYS lives to intercede for THEM”. Whoever goes to God through Christ has Christ interceding on THEIR behalf…not just their family’s or their church’s or their friend’s…theirs. How awesome is that?! We have a personal Savior who passionately loves us. Yes.

Redeemed

1 Corinthians 15:20-22

“But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”

Isn't it so cool that though man brought death upon himself, God loves us so passionately and unabashedly that He sent Christ as a man to redeem man. He could have just redeemed us, but He showed us that anything can be redeemed, so He sent Christ as man. So cool!

Never Go To Bed Angry

 

Romans 13:8“[Love Fulfills the Law] Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law.” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

The phrase, “never go to bed angry” which comes from the scripture, “never let the sun go down on your anger” is more than just a ‘penny for your thoughts’ phrase, it is truth. As humans we love to sit in our anger, for some it gives them the feeling a power, strength, control, for others it gives them reasons to be pitied, they feel justified in their anger or resentment or bitterness. It is okay for appropriate grieving and such, however we must NOT sit in our anger, that will not get anyone anywhere except straight down the slippery slope to nowhere good. There is power in forgiveness, anyone can sit in their anger and let it control them (though many think they are controlling it), however, it takes so much more grace, strength, and love to forgive, but in it, there is so much more freedom. If you don’t take anything else I say, take this, in forgiveness there is freedom, trust me, better yet, trust God.

By His Wounds

1 Peter 2:24““He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.”” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

By HIS wounds WE are HEALED. I think sometimes we wallow too much in our own wounds…we never let the grace of God heal them, we want to sit in them for the sake of pity, anger, attention, bitterness, selfishness, feelings…etc. Now don’t get this confused with appropriate grieving or things of the sort, but we all too often get caught in the “woe is me” bubble and many times bring others down with us, sadly we bring the name of Christ down with us as well. He sacrificed everything for us, He healed us, let’s focus on Him, and give Him praise.

We Would Like to Say We Wouldn’t Be Pharisees

Isaiah 53:3-4“He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted.” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

I think we would all like to say we wouldn’t be Pharisees if we were in Jesus’ day, however, sadly, most of the “Christian” population and just the world’s population in general would be wrong, would reject Christ. Interesting thought, well truth, Jesus wasn’t like the Jesus we saw on flannel graph as small children, or even here about from televangelists, etc. He was the son of woman who was pregnant out of wedlock (didn’t fly well back then, if Joseph hadn’t been a man of God, she could’ve been killed) and well, He was just different. As an adult of course He did those miracles we all heard about, but He did so much more too! He ate with the sinners, talked with the lowly, the poor, to put it in relevant terms, he had dinner with the “johns” and prostitutes and showed them love in a different way than anyone had, through His Father. We depict Him as blue eyed and soft featured, when really, he was most likely brown eyes, probably some scraggily brown hair, beard, etc. All to say, if you haven’t read it already, you should check out Phillip Yancey’s “The Jesus I Never Knew”. And yeah, if we saw him back then, if we were honest, we would probably have rejected him as well sadly. He loved everyone, yet most rejected Him.

Ransom

1 Timothy 2:5-6“For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time.” Brought to you by BibleGateway.com. Copyright (C) . All Rights Reserved.

God’s one and only Son gave Himself as our ransom. We were in prison, ready to be killed, we were on death row, sentenced for life…Christ came and said, “I love you so much, I will take your punishment for you, go, be free, and tell everyone of who I am and how I love”. Did we, do we deserve that? NO. Think on that.