Slavic Christian call to love

Dear Slavic Christian, if you’re raising children without loving and connecting with them, what’s the point?

If you’re preaching or serving in church without love, what’s the point?

If you’re talking about Jesus without loving those in your home and around you, what’s the point?

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 says, “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

This passage compels me to love like Jesus daily, even when I struggle to do so. Then I remember: I don’t exist for any other reason.

This passage says, you can be the greatest preacher, and if you don’t love like Jesus, your sermons are useless because they don’t point people to His love.

It says you can suffer and die for a cause, but if you didn’t love the people who tortured you and sent you to your death, your “martyrdom” is pointless.

It says you can have and use spiritual gifts, but if they don’t glorify the love that Jesus showed the world, then your gifts are useless in God’s eyes because you’ve made your gifts about yourself.

…I don’t exist to serve in church, take care of my home, work for someone, make babies, do therapy, or anything else.

I simply exist to love my Creator and Savior, allow that love to overflow onto those around me, and be loved by them.

Through that love, I can serve generously, work with integrity, raise babies with joy, minister to others with a compassionate heart, forgive as I’ve been forgiven, etc. 

That’s the standard that Christ set for me when He gave up His life for mine, while I was still a sinner. 

That’s the standard that the heroes of the faith set for us when they left all they had to follow Jesus wholeheartedly and changed the world with their trust and obedience in Christ. 

That’s the faith I must radiate to a lost world that is looking for hope in all the wrong places.

That’s the grace and mercy that people don’t know about because legalism has turned people away from Christ instead of toward Him.

That’s the transformation one receives when they understand how much God loves His children, as He created us to be an extension of His Kingdom on Earth.

That’s love.

Dear one, check your heart today, what motive are you living from? 

Have you experienced this love to give it away to people that may not deserve it when you feel alone, misunderstood, or frustrated?

Do you daily refuel from God to overflow onto others?

Think about this…