LOVE IS...

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.

-1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (NKJV)

In my study time the other day, I read the popular scripture of 1 Corinthians 13; I say popular because many of the weddings I have attended, including my own, have used 1 Corinthians 13 as one of the scripture readings during the ceremony. While I read these familiar words I was struck by how little I had really paid attention to their meaning. In fact, I remember choosing this scripture for my wedding simply because it spoke about love; I never bothered to take the time to actually hear the message and take it to heart. So today I want to share with you what the Lord revealed to me about 1 Corinthians 13, in particular verses 4-8, when I actually listened.

In our culture, we throw the “L” word around so freely that it seems to have little or no meaning at all. I am sure most of us have used “love” to describe how much we enjoy or like our favorite food, movie, car, clothes, etc. Yet one can hardly argue that the “love” we have for lasagna can compare to the love of Christ. We have people falling in and out of “love” all the time with more and more marriages ending in divorce because they no longer “love” each other. This certainly can’t be the love Jesus spoke of in Matthew 22:37-39 when He said, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it; You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” Could it be the same love spoken of in John 3:16-17? “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” I see no resemblance between the two. How can love be the greatest of faith, hope and love if its true meaning is everything and anything under the sun that we have a strong affinity for?

The true meaning of love is described and defined in detail by 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, “Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.” Because there is so much to be unpacked and explored in these verses, I am going to spend the next several weeks looking at 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 with you in the “Plugged In to the Radiant Son” devotionals. So, until next week, I challenge you to notice and explore what you say you “love” and what it is that you really love.

COACH'S CALL TO ACTION

• What is that you say you “love”?
  
• What do you believe you truly love?
  
• What is the difference between the two?
  
• How would you define love?

Copyright © 2010 BODY FOR CHRIST MINISTRIES. All rights reserved.

WANDERING IN THE WILDERNESS

Dear Friend,
Your prayers and support have helped to bring me to the edge of my spiritual wilderness and I thank you so very much! Over the next several months, I will be transitioning from "Radiant Sun Life Coaching" to "Body for Christ Ministries" as this is what the Lord has been calling me to for some time now. This will have little to no impact on the distribution of the weekly devotionals, but I wanted to keep you informed as I value your continued support and prayers for this transition. Thank you and God bless!

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But the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. There we saw giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.”

-Numbers 13:31-33 (NKJV)

Moses obediently sent a leader from each of the tribes of Israel to spy out the land that God had promised them. However, upon their return, ten of the twelve spies gave an unfavorable report to the people saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. There we saw giants; and were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” (Numbers 13:32 & 33) Only two of the twelve leaders sent as spies, Caleb and Joshua, had faith that the Lord would bring them into the land and give it to them. Because of their unbelief, the people of Israel were destined to wander in the wilderness for 40 years before coming in to the Promised Land.

With the bad report from the ten spies, the people of Israel once again wished they had stayed in Egypt and even wished they had perished there; rather than face a difficult battle with the giants that stood between them and the Land of Promise. I have been in this place for the past few months; I have scoped out the land ahead and I can see the giants I will need to face and conquer to enter the Land of Promise. While my giants aren’t a people large in stature, they are no less daunting and the thought of facing them causes me to wince in pain. So I have been wandering through my own spiritual wilderness these last few months; unwilling to face my giants, unwilling to step up to the challenge. But God is faithful and He has used this wilderness experience to prepare me and bring me to the place of total faith and trust in Him. Only by faith will He bring me into the Land of Promise that He has for me.

So often we shrink away from the battles that lie ahead; afraid of facing those giants in our life. Instead we willingly choose to walk through the spiritual wilderness; a place of dryness, lacking the living water of Christ. We may believe that God exists, that He is the creator of the universe; we may believe that Jesus Christ is our Savior, that He died for our sins; while we may believe all of this, we fail to have faith in Him if we shrink away from what God is calling us to do or who God is calling us to be. Only by faith will we conquer the giants that stand between the wilderness and the Land of Promise. We must trust in Him and His will for us, for it is not by our own strength that we will arrive in the Promised Land, but by the grace of God; by His power, by His strength.

COACH'S CALL TO ACTION

• What is God calling you to or who is He calling you to be?
  
• What are the giants that are standing in your path?
  
• What must you do to overcome, to conquer these giants?
  
• When will you take that step of faith?

Copyright © 2010 BODY FOR CHRIST MINISTRIES. All rights reserved.