Love’s pure light

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or conceited or proud;  love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs; love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth.  Love never gives up; and its faith, hope, and patience never fail.

Love is eternal.

Love is patient
Matthew 4:12-17 (1/8/2017)

A child may be happy, but not yet know joy. A child may act unselfishly, but not yet be humble. A child may be affectionate and loyal, the true seeds of love, but not yet be capable of love itself. Love is an attribute of wisdom, of maturity, of being grown up, of becoming like God, because God is love. And we see love, we know love, when we look at Jesus, love’s pure light.

Love is not proud
Matthew 5:1-10 (1/15/2017)

You get what you want. When you are proud, when you have to put yourself first, when you value yourself above everything else, that’s what you get: your self, and nothing more. Have fun with that!

Love is not irritable
Matthew 5:21-24 (1/22/2017)

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or conceited or proud; love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable … but sometimes love gets angry. Love is not about being nice. It’s not about being pleasant and agreeable. It’s not about being sweet. Love is not about being loving …

Love does not keep a record of wrongs
Matthew 5:43-48 (1/29/2017)

We do enough, sadly, we who call ourselves Christians, to sully God’s good name and diminish God’s reputation, but won’t the world stand in awe of a God whose children love their enemies? Who even try?

Love is happy with the truth
Matthew 7:13-14 (2/5/2017)

Which means that if we have lots of company, if we are easily moving along with the flow, if we find ourselves comfortably and happily going where pretty much everybody else is going, we are well on our way … to hell! Seriously!

Followers of Jesus are like Jesus: out of step, non-conforming, countercultural, different …

Love never gives up
Matthew 9:32-38 (2/12/2017)

Love is not about itself. Love is about that “one:” caring about that “one,” investing in that “one,” sacrificing for that “one,” laser-focussed on the happiness and well-being of that “one.” If love gave up, it would be giving up that “one,” caring no more about that “one,” invested no more in the happiness of that “one,” and love would cease to exist, because love doesn’t exist without its object. So if love is, love never gives up.

Love is eternal
1 Corinthians 13:8-10 (2/19/2017)

Love is eternal. You don’t need money. You don’t need power. You don’t need a break. You don’t need opportunity. You don’t need success. You don’t need to leave a legacy. All you need in life is this one moment. All you need is love in this one moment, and your life, both now and forever, will mean something, and your life will matter, and you will know God, because God is love.