Hope in Love
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On this mother’s day, I need to begin with a joke about Dads because I heard the joke and it accidentally became a joke that we can go tell for a long, long time in our family. A guy was giving a stand up routine and I saw it, and I have never forgotten it and now neither have my kids and I bet neither will you.
The man walks on stage and begins,
you know they say when people are dying, that they can get really wise, so it’s really important to pay attention and never forget those last words a person says before they die. Like my Dad, He died back when I was a teenager, we were together right before he died, and I’ll never forget the last words he said to me,
“Are you still holding the ladder?”
If you didn’t get it, just ask someone who spontaneously starts laughing later.
In seriousness, we do value last words as really important.
the beginning of the movie Love Actually points our a truth. When people are able to know that they are about to die, but still have their minds, like those on September 11th or accidents where the person has some time before their inevitable passing their is an overwhelming desire to let their loved ones know of their love for them. Their mothers, fathers, children, spouses, friends and more. Phone calls of I love you, scrawling messages with anything that can be found of love for family.
Love is incredibly powerful. It’s what today is supposed to be celebrated, on this mother’s day. The work of a mother to bring life, and continue life. Usually, you can take a room full of hard core men, start speaking about the love of a mother and get them all crying.
Love is powerful, Look at this truth -
12 Hatred stirs up quarrels, but love makes up for all offenses.
We can bring peace through love. Words of love can bring peace to an argument. Actions of love will fix broken relationships. A lifestyle of love, what could happen then?
1 A gentle answer turns away anger, but a harsh word stirs up wrath.
Mothers might tell their children to hug it out. And even though that isn’t necessarily love, if we actually practice love it still works in adulthood . Act like the Christ warrior that you are, follow Jesus when the most natural, the most childish response is to fight back, to get more angry, to scare them. Yet what happens if we respond with love and gentleness. This is how Jesus actually responds. He doesn’t back down from evil. He responds with acts of clarity because he responded with love.
Jesus shows us this in that His greatest act of love which was also an act of death.
16 We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another.
Jesus gave up his life as a sacrifice for our sins in front of his own mother, because justice had to be paid, the sins could not go unpunished. Love and justice go hand in hand.
If you don’t have justice than you just have a cover-up, which is unloving to not only the victim but the perpetrator who never realizes the opportunity for change.
Jesus act of his own love therefore paid for all of our offenses. And we, the sinners, actually have to come to realize the horror of our ways to accept what he did for us.
8 If we say, “We have no sin,” we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Jesus loves us, Jesus cleanses us, and it’s because of that truth, that mothers and fathers need to look at how we raise our own children with the same kind of love that God has for us.
Think about this. Think about how special the Love of Jesus is. It is over and above what almost all mothers, no matter their religion or lack of religion loves their child. God gave it to mothers naturally, and we are very very grateful. But the love of Jesus is something totally additional and yes mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, all of us who claim to be followers of Jesus are called to love like he actually loves us.
Love Others like Jesus Loves
Love Others like Jesus Loves
This kind of love puts others before ourselves, just as Jesus put us before Himself.. It is really hard to get to that kind of love for other people. Self-sacrificing kind of love. It’s almost impossible. You can do something really cool, but not come close to the kind of love
16 “This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life.
17 God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again.
18 Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.
Let me describe to you how hard it is to love with this kind of love.
I got to be part of something really good this week, every student should have access to materials that help them read, learn how to count and do math, learn about the science and history of the world. All of you had those subjects in school but my students really didn’t until a few years ago when a friend of mine and I worked on a project together of getting a curriculum in the schools for students who were non-speaking. When we got my fellow teachers, especially that hero right there Tabitha, came alongside and really started using it. This week Tabitha and I spoke along with the head of our entire special education department before our bosses boss and their bosses and a bunch of others leaders in the district and the curriculum is now a permanent part of the curriculum for Lodi Unified. To God be the glory!
My friends, it was a great day, and it will help a lot of people. There was a lot of love shown, but it wasn’t the same kind of love that Jesus gives us. Because I get a curriculum that works for me. I made my own life easier. We can do some awesome nice things for people, and it can be nice for us. This curriculum m will help my students and also makes my life easier. The students win but I win to.
So many people do great and nice things for people, people they really love, or even people they think they might love, and it benefits the one doing. It is wonderful, everything is good with doing that. Do more of that but
Jesus died for us when we didn’t even like Him.
Jesus died for us when we didn’t even like Him.
8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Sinners, that is the word used, and it means that when we are going against what God wanted He still sacrificed himself for us.
A mother’s love is not like that naturally. Most mom’s all over the world love their babies. They protect them, and they keep protecting them even when they are 60. But Mom’s get something out of it. They get the God given desire to see their children do well. .
My mom showed me remarkable love but she also got to say to me in the greatest conversation of my life that she was very proud of the man I am. It feels my heart with love everyday but I also know that brought her great joy as well. Its amazing a true gift from God.
And this is the tough part, because Love is like that though. Love is generous and it is almost impossible to out give. Love will keep coming back, keep blessing, keep rewarding, Love is like that because God is like that.
8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
It’s why when directing followers of Jesus in any problem, any argument, the solution first begins with love. Whether you know you will benefit from the solution or not, we lead with love.
Think about how you know you love a person. When I lead a memorial service people who love the person will gather and share. I don’t even know the person but I will learn how people love them and it’s often the weird little things a person would do, a saying they had, habits, or the things that really would get them excited. I’ve heard jokes and I’ve seen mementos. The love transforms it all. Love changes things. I’ve seen cigarettes buried with a person who died of lung cancer. Love can change perception. Love can fix fights, love can bring worth.
8 Above all, maintain constant love for one another, since love covers a multitude of sins.
Love covers a multitude of sins, Love your enemies.
Stay right here for a second. Meditate on this.
44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
Realize the radical nature of the love of Jesus Christ. It isn’t popular still. It really challenges me. I can let anger, pride and hatred motivate me to fight for what I think is right. I can talk crap about people, get into gossip, but all of that is the exact opposite of the love of God. There is no hope there.
I don’t even care if a person is a three time convicted felon caught on video doing horrible things, we begin with love.
Does that scare you?
I It makes people scared, but look at what Jesus did.
18 For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God.
Since Christ suffered in this way we are told to
44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
Perhaps though you might say if I love like your talking about than everyone is going to take all my stuff, they are going to treat me like crap, they will use me and lose me.
Stay with me for a minute, because I’m going somewhere because God loves justice but we need to stay in a place where we honestly ask ourselves
why am I afraid to love like Jesus wants me to love?
why am I afraid to love like Jesus wants me to love?
Jesus said where your treasure is that is where your heart is also and if we put of all our love into making our lives healthier, better, nicer, than we already have our reward but if we love like Jesus loves, than our reward is even greater, it’s huge, it comes from him.
What if we embrace the actual love of Jesus, because
The love of Jesus is stronger than fear.
The love of Jesus is stronger than fear.
Jesus told God that he did not want to have to go through with the betrayal and the sacrifice of himself on the cross, but he told the Father, “Not my will but yours be done.”
In the books about Jesus, the gospels, you will see everyone else afraid, not Jesus,
When the crowds saw Jesus heal a dead person,
16 Then fear came over everyone, and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has risen among us,” and “God has visited his people.”
When the disciples saw him walk on water
25 He said to them, “Where is your faith?” They were fearful and amazed, asking one another, “Who then is this? He commands even the winds and the waves, and they obey him!”
When the religious leaders wanted to arrest Jesus
46 Although they were looking for a way to arrest him, they feared the crowds, because the people regarded him as a prophet.
But God has told us that
18 There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears is not complete in love.
And Jesus is complete in love.
It is why he could love us with an amazing ability to sacrifice himself for us.
What about you?
If at first you fear being conned, taking advantage of or used.
Let me ask, why is that your first fear?
Are you conning Jesus? Is it because you recognize what you have done to others?
I recognize it in myself. Too often I join in the crowd. Too often I forget to pray for my leaders, pray for my enemies, pray for my bosses, pray for those who disagree with me, To often I forget to love those who can do nothing for me.
Do we worry that if Jesus found out the way we actually live, than He would reject you so you must hide what you have done, hide what you desire. Because if Jesus knew He would reject you.
First, thanks for the honest reflection. Second, perhaps you need to hear yourself say, that you actually live like you can fool God. Any amount of wisdom will tell you if you can fool God than He isn’t God. You can’t fool Jesus. He’s better than a mom with eyes in the back of their head. He actually is everywhere for all time.
You know that and I am just reminding you.
Jesus knows all of you and still loves you. Followers of Him by loving others the same way.
Jesus knows all of you and still loves you. Followers of Him by loving others the same way.
Third, maybe we think Jesus loved sacrifically so we don’t have to, like a mom who works two shifts so their kids can go to college.
No, this is the command.
16 And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.
As a person who teaches math and also teaches about God I need you to know, this is not symmetrical
Love is not God. But we must love as God loves. We cannot come close to knowing love unless we pursue love the way that God loves us.
5 Now the goal of our instruction is love that comes from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.
This is when we begin to see that God’s love is not a passive love. It is not a ride or die kind of love. God loved us enough to have a way out but if we reject it His true love allows for liberty.
God hates sin. This is why you can’t con God. We don’t need to have a kind of love for others that allows them to steal from us or abuse us. The whole act of Jesus sacrifice was because God must have justice for sin. You do not need to say sin is ok because somehow it is unloving if you don’t take pride in every act or belief another person has in their life. No, we love God first, His ways
9 Let love be without hypocrisy. Detest evil; cling to what is good.
A mother can discipline her child, hate everything about what a child is doing, make sure in her best efforts that the child is following her discipline and all of that very much comes from a place of love. A mother who doesn’t discipline her children or allow consequences for her children because she can’t stomach seeing her child upset is actually a horrible mother.
All of us are to love with courage to detest evil while still loving other as Christ loves them. This is not easy. It isn’t easy for others to do to you. It is the radical life that Jesus has called us to live. Seek it out, Strive for you. Go to God asking him for the strength to love everyday. If you do it will be the best mother’s day present you could ever give, because Love, is defined by God
7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
