I want to share a challenge. I am at a loss for words which is a strange, but lately, common thing for me. So, since I don't have the words I will let someone else speak them.
Please click on the embedded video and don't move from this spot. Stop everything else, just listen and watch. It will take just a little less than an hour but you won't notice.
May God have mercy on us!
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Learning to Love Different People
It's Saturday morning, the snow has drifted, and the fire in the fireplace has made the house seem very cozy, very "homey". As I listen to the crackling fire John Piper is speaking somewhere in the background. I am happy here in this place, beautiful sounds fill my ears, and then I actually listen to what is being said. John Piper is speaking about training children to ignore skin color when it comes to real Christian love. Then, suddenly, something that he says captures my attention. "You don't have to get your happiness from feeling superior to other people."
The Lord has been speaking to my heart of late about identity, how we define who we are. Piper's words resonated in my heart. Another piece to the puzzle. Then, another statement, Piper to his daughter Talitha, "...you should love people different from yourself, not in order to be accepted by God, but because...", Talitha in response finishing the statement, "... because I am accepted by God."
Doesn't the scripture say, "For as he thinks in his heart, so is he."(Prov. 23:7a)? I know the context of this scripture is speaking of an evil man, but this is a principle that reaches beyond this specific scripture. As we think in our hearts, so are we. So many other scriptures reflect this. When the scripture talks of walking in the flesh rather than in the Spirit or vice versa, is it not relating to a heart issue? This scripture speaks of a Christian's understanding of who they are, a result of their thought processes, reflecting in their actions. We act from our understanding of who we are, our sense of identity. God intends to change our actions based on a true understanding of who we are, or rather, who He has made us in Christ. "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." (Rom. 12:1-2).
With all this in mind, we should do the right things, we should be obedient, not to be accepted by God but because we are accepted by God in Christ. If we really understand who we have been made in Christ then that understanding will be reflected in the way we think, act, and speak.
I will probably post more on identity in the future, but for now I leave you with a link to John Piper's sermon that sparked this post.
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Sermons/ByTopic/48/4482_Help_the_Children_Love_the_Different_People/
The Lord has been speaking to my heart of late about identity, how we define who we are. Piper's words resonated in my heart. Another piece to the puzzle. Then, another statement, Piper to his daughter Talitha, "...you should love people different from yourself, not in order to be accepted by God, but because...", Talitha in response finishing the statement, "... because I am accepted by God."
Doesn't the scripture say, "For as he thinks in his heart, so is he."(Prov. 23:7a)? I know the context of this scripture is speaking of an evil man, but this is a principle that reaches beyond this specific scripture. As we think in our hearts, so are we. So many other scriptures reflect this. When the scripture talks of walking in the flesh rather than in the Spirit or vice versa, is it not relating to a heart issue? This scripture speaks of a Christian's understanding of who they are, a result of their thought processes, reflecting in their actions. We act from our understanding of who we are, our sense of identity. God intends to change our actions based on a true understanding of who we are, or rather, who He has made us in Christ. "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." (Rom. 12:1-2).
With all this in mind, we should do the right things, we should be obedient, not to be accepted by God but because we are accepted by God in Christ. If we really understand who we have been made in Christ then that understanding will be reflected in the way we think, act, and speak.
I will probably post more on identity in the future, but for now I leave you with a link to John Piper's sermon that sparked this post.
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Sermons/ByTopic/48/4482_Help_the_Children_Love_the_Different_People/
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