Romans 12: 9-10
9 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves.
These two verses sum up our calling as Christians. They are not difficult verses to understand. We are to love sincerely...that is the difficult part. Sometimes, my aggravation and emotions get the best of me and a wall is constructed between me and the person I am communicating with. I think we all can get carried away and distracted from our ultimate goal here on earth. The mission to love includes sharing Jesus with a dying world. That also is a difficult thing to do. It is easy to understand the instruction, but difficult to follow through in carrying it out.
We are instructed to hate. Who said that Christians are to never hate? Do you really think God only loves? God hates sin. After all, sin is what nailed His Son on the cross to save this world from suffering forever. We are to hate sin, just as God hates sin. That doesn't mean that a person who is an alcoholic will be hated by Christians. The sin is not the sinner. If we went around hating the sinner, we would all hate each other...and that wouldn't be a very pleasant sight.
Finally, we are to love one another above our own selves. God tells us in John (chapter 15, verse 13) that, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends". This verse isn't only talking about the willingness to sacrifice our lives for those we love, but that we sacrifice our time, our money, our possessions, etc. I believe if we all would begin to put our friends, family, and even strangers, above ourselves, we would experience life in an entire new way.
Love sincerely. Hate sin. Place others first.
No comments:
Post a Comment