The Greatest Gift Is Available To You All Year
Category Archives: Spiritual Growth
Christmas Living
Live a life of wonder and generosity. What would it be like if you carried the energy, happiness and kindness of Christmas all year?
The Best Thing
We Are Not Alone
During this season of Hope remember we are celebrating Immanuel, which means ‘God is with us.’ Christ came so we would not be alone.
- And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age – Matthew 28:20
- I will never fail you. I will never abandon you – Hebrews 13:5
The scars that we all experience send the message you are alone. My hope and prayer is that through this season and next year you will know that you are loved, valued and enjoyed.
Validation
Identity Comes From a Source
Identity comes from a source. Identity is something that is given or bestowed while we are in relationship with others. The validation of our identity is understood by how we impact others. We have a longing to know that we matter in the lives of others, that we make a difference and that we can’t be replaced.
10 Ways to Love
Love Must Have An Object Or A Focus
Love must have an object or a focus. In the Bible, love is described as personal and selfless always desiring the best for others. The ultimate expression of love is God’s love in sending his Son to die on the cross to save sinners – Romans 5:8; John 3:16; 1 John 4:10. Christians should be known by the fact that they love God and others – John 13:34-35. Love is best seen in actions and should be identified with what we do—in our compassion and commitment to those around us – 1 John 4:19. How we love others with our attitudes and behavior should reflect God’s love. Jesus said that only two commands are needed to govern our lives: love of God and love of neighbor – Matthew 22:36-40. “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love” – 1 John 4:8
Grace
Learn To Extend Grace
Grace is what all of us long to experience in our relationships, the problem is we usually have a hard time giving grace to each other. A definition of Grace is giving or receiving unmerited favor. Giving someone something that they do not deserve. We see grace in our relationship with Christ when He loves us, forgives us and is always with us when we don’t deserve it. Is it possible for a couple to relate to each other this way? I think the goal of every couple is to give grace to each other.
The ability to extend grace is one of the qualities that strong thriving couples posses. Creating an attitude of grace will help you to accept and love yourself and your partner. Every partner despite their best intentions, are fallible and imperfect. It’s easy to show grace to people who treat you well and do what you want. It is much harder to show grace to those who offend you or with whom you disagree. Grace creates an attitude of acceptance, patience and love that allows us to look beyond struggles and conflict and respond with kind words or a hug instead of silence or scorn. So rather than reacting with statements to your partner like, ‘How could you be so stupid?’ or ‘We wouldn’t be having this problem if only you wouldn’t have done that,’ you can learn that the best option is to extend grace instead.
True grace is empowered buy the love of Christ. If you struggle to give grace to yourself or others spend time pondering the love of Christ. He fully and completely loves you. God will grow your capacity to give and receive grace as you walk with Him.
But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8 ESV
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ESV
Grace means there is nothing I can do to make God love me more, and nothing I can do to make God love me less. Philip Yancey
Connection
Lean Into Risk
Our biggest regrets in life are the chances we didn’t take, the relationships we were afraid to have and the decisions we waited too long to make. I don’t like risk. I love a good challenge and pushing the edge but I avoid emotional risk and uncertainty…… I think most of us do. We are afraid to be hurt so we create a wall that we think holds back the risk of pain. The real problem is that all it holds back is the true joy that comes from emotional connection.
God Delights in You
Loathe, despise and fight evil. Strive to never hate anything God has created. Especially yourself. It is sad that we learn to hate ourselves or others. Don’t hate the very thing God delights and created with great joy. Learn to love and delight in yourself
The Lord your God is with you,
the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
in his love he will no longer rebuke you,
but will rejoice over you with singing.” – Zephaniah 3:17Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son. – Ephesians 1
Does Love Really Cover a Multitude of Sins?
A Biblical Way to View Conflict
Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:8
We are meant to live in community. One of the unavoidable aspects of living in community is that we will sin against one another. The journey of living in Christian community is one that is tested by other people’s sin and weakness.
Everyone reacts differently when they are sinned against by another Christian. Some react by sulking and feeling sorry for themselves. Some just blow up with anger or passive aggressive withdrawal. The problem is that there are as many ways to react badly to sin as there are ways to sin against one another. The Bible gives us two loving ways that we can react to being sinned against. We can overlook the sin or we can address the sin.
The eighteenth chapter of Matthew provides a detailed roadmap for addressing sin, but before a person follows that route, he first needs to determine whether or not this is the kind of sin he can simply overlook. Overlooking a sin is held high in Scripture.
Proverbs 19:11 – “Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense.”
Proverbs 12:16 – “the prudent ignores an insult”
1 Peter 4:8 – “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.”
Love covers a multitude of sins, but there are situations in which the most loving action is to address a sin, to make known to the other person that you have been offended by his words or deeds, and to give him the opportunity to repent and seek forgiveness.
Here is how you can go about determining whether this is an offense you should overlook, or an offense you should address.
Rules for Self Discovery:
1. What we want most;
2. What we think about most;
3. How we use our money;
4. What we do with our leisure time;
5. The company we enjoy;
6. Who and what we admire;
7. What we laugh at.
A.W. Tozer