Category: LOVE

Be A Model!

Dollars to donuts that some (many?) will think I am talking about a fashion model. No. I’m talking about being a model for others in how you live your life. Just like Jesus while on this earth was a model for all of us on how to live. Be a model!

I’m far from perfect. What I’m really good at is sinning. But I try to correct those sins and serve as a model for others, starting with my family. I do my best to be a model.

What does being a model mean? It means living the life that Jesus called us to live and showed by His life. That starts with LOVE, as Jesus commanded us to LOVE.

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:34-35

Jesus took being a model of LOVE to the Nth degree. He gave His life for us to absolve our sins, when we acknowledge them. Hi paid the ultimate price for us. He was our model!

You don’t have to die to be a model to others. Just be nice. Smile. Help. Give. Don’t sleep on your anger. Forgive. The list goes on. Aspire to live how Jesus lives. Just be a model for others that reflects Jesus in your actions.

Be a model! And think about that this weekend and next week. Enjoy!

Rise of the Anti-Christs

There are more so-called “christians” who profess their love of Jesus Christ but who spew hatred. These are the anti-Christs who are increasing in number and becoming more vocal. Sadly, what they don’t realize is that they are actually followers of the devil, Satan, Lucifer, whatever.

Jesus gave us one very clear commandment. “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:34-35

Jesus wasn’t talking about loving your family, loved ones, friends, and people close to you. He wasn’t talking about being selective in your LOVE. Jesus was talking not just about his apostles loving one another but He was talking to all of us to LOVE each other, regardless of who we or they are.

So, this is as clear as daylight. LOVE and you are a disciple of Jesus. You are a CHRIST-ian. Don’t LOVE and you are not a follower of Jesus. NOT a CHRIST-ian. This is all very simple.

Hate is spewed by the devil that tries to drive a wedge between you and Jesus. It spews hate. So, if you spew hate it’s pretty clear who you follow. At best you are anti the command of Jesus. You are an anti-christian. This is all pretty simple.

And let’s not forget that God the Father commanded us to “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18) before He gave us HIs Son to demonstrate that LOVE by the sacrifice of His life.

Enjoy your day walking in the Father’s and Son’s command to LOVE!

Where Is God?

With all the strife and outright wars going on in the world I find myself asking where God is. How can a God defined by love allow so much bad stuff to happen? However, as I start thinking about this the answer pops right out at me. God is there. He is always there. He is less than a heart beat away. He’s waiting for us to turn to Him. He’s waiting for us to treat one another the way we would want to be treated. We’re the ones screwing up. Not God.

If God were calling all the shots day in and day out we would be mere puppets on strings. But God gave us free will to exercise that free will. He may be shaking His head watching us hate and even kill but it’s our decisions. We are a free people—at least while we are on this earth. Then, when time is up, we will be looking back what we did. That accounting determines where we spend eternity.

The decision of what to do and how to act is ours and ours alone. God may be watching but He is not pulling the strings. You can turn your life over to Him but it’s still your free will in control. I just try to make sure that my free will is in concert with what God wants me to do and how to act.

God is never missing in our lives. We are missing in God’s life by choice.

Think about this. Are your actions day in, day out in concert with God? And, remember, His commandment is to LOVE so if you are walking in LOVE you are walking with God.

Think about this and enjoy the day (with an ever-present God!).

Are You Risen?

Easter is now a memory. We celebrated Jesus rising from the dead. He died for us—our sins past, present, and future. Truly repent what you have done and your sins vanish. The operative word is “truly.” You can’t just slough your sins away. You need to anguish in repenting. Jesus is risen. The question now is if you have risen.

My idea of Easter on a personal level is rising up with Jesus. Leaving the “death” of sin aside and rising up to a new life. Sure, I will once again sin along the way. I’m an imperfect child of God and a pretty good sinner on occasion. But I strive for perfection and try to rise up with Jesus.

This isn’t some religious mumbo-jumbo. Rising up involves following Jesus by starting with the one commandment He left us—to LOVE. You can’t rise up with Jesus unless you rise up in LOVE. Not selective LOVE but LOVE of everyone. It starts with a smile, a helping hand, going out of your way, turning the other cheek, and simply treating others the way we want to be treated. LOVE. It’s a Real Secret to Life and it’s the one simple commandment that Jesus gave us.

Enjoy the week and walk in LOVE.

Rise of the Fake “christians”

This is a tough post to write. Clearly, Jesus sent a message to not judge. To look at the log in your own eye before focusing on the splinter in someone else’s eye. But I can’t help it if I am judging. Not that I’m putting myself up as perfection. Trust me, I’m the world’s best sinner. But I just have to write about all the self-professed “christians” (I won’t even dignify it with a capital “C”) out there. Wearing their “christianity” on their sleeves while acting anything like a true Christian.

Let me just be direct and to the point. Jesus made it very, very, very clear that as a follower of His—and that’s what a Christian is, a follower of Jesus—you need to LOVE. No excuses, no outs. You LOVE everyone, regardless of who they are and what they stand for. LOVE. It’s that simple.

I see and hear more people professing their “christianity” but don’t do anything close to loving. They are name callers, are vindictive, and are so far from loving that they are not even close. Jesus is shaking His head while the devil is licking his chops. Because the so called “christians” are not only anything but real Christians. They are devil followers, even if they don’t realize it.

There. I know I am judging and I’ll confess that sin. And I’m not hating the so called rising “christians” because I would be a hypocrite and not a true Christian. I’m doing my very best to LOVE them because that is what Jesus commanded.

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35)

Can this be any clearer???

Have a great rest of the week walking in LOVE.

Unload Your Burdens

What a great New Year’s resolution: Unload all your burdens in life. How and where to unload? The answer is on whom to unload them.

David said, “Cast your burden on the Lord, And He shall sustain you; He shall never permit the righteous to be moved.” (Psalms 55:23)

Jesus underscored this to Himself by telling us, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)

I wrote the other day about surrendering to Jesus. Completely and totally. When you surrender to Him you off lift your burdens to Him. You give Jesus your burdens and He gives you peace and joy in return. The burdens are gone as long as you really and truly surrender.

If you are bogged down with burdens in life, make this your New Year’s resolution: Unload your burdens on Jesus. Surrender to Him. Your burdens will be gone and in their place will be peace and joy. Don’t believe it? Try it.

Don’t know how to surrender to Jesus? Simply open up to Him and tell Jesus that you surrender to Him. True surrender means you are walking in love. Just as Jesus commanded.

I’ll be back before Christmas but in the meantime start unloading those burdens.

Enjoy the week ahead!

Jesus: Surrender and Rebirth

There is never a better time than Christmas to surrender to Jesus and share in His birth—our rebirth. Just as Jesus surrendered on the cross, and then was “reborn” in his spirit body, now is the time for us to do the same. Surrender completely to Jesus and be “reborn” with Him this Christmas.

What is surrender? Jesus had one commandment for us—to LOVE everyone.

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35)

So, surrendering to Jesus is really simple—just LOVE one another. That means laying down any anger, hate, and any other emotion that is not LOVE. Complete surrender is complete LOVE. There are no exceptions. Do this and as we celebrate the birth of Jesus. And celebrate our “rebirth” in Jesus. It’s an amazing feeling.

I know that in this world of division, animosity, and hate it is easy to in the very least be angry with people and bear grudges. I get angry all the time at people. But anger gets in the way of surrendering—and rebirth. Surrendering is putting everything but LOVE aside. Not easy; but necessary.

I’ll be back before Christmas but wishing all the very best of this magical season.

On Christians, Fake Christians, and Anti-Christians

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” John 15:12

That can’t be any clearer. If you call yourself a “Christian” that means you are a follower of Jesus Christ. And Jesus was very clear about his commandment to us. LOVE. Noting complicated. Simple as it gets. LOVE. LOVE and you are a Christian. Don’t LOVE and you are not a Christian. That means if you talk bad about others, don’t treat others with LOVE, spew hatred, judge others, etc.—you get the picture—you are not a Christian. You either LOVE or you don’t.

I listen to a lot of people who call themselves Christians—including a LOT of politicians—who simply are not. They are fake Christians. Now, I’m not judging anyone. I’m simply saying if you don’t talk and walk in LOVE you are not a follower and believer in Jesus Christ. You’re not a Christian.

And to anyone who thinks they are a Christian but are antisemitic, I have a news flash for you. You are anti-Christian. Why? Because it may be a startling revelation to you but Jesus wasn’t a Christian. He was as Jewish as it gets. Through and through.

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” Matthew 5:17

Jesus the Jew came to fulfill the Jewish Law. What always gets lost in translation is that Jesus was a Jew. I’m not talking about the state of Israel and all the conflict in the Middle East. I’m just saying that Jesus was a practicing Jew. So, being anti-semitic is anti-Jesus the Christ. Anti-Christian

The world is an increasingly dark place these days. It needs more LOVE. It needs more true Christians, followers of Jesus the Christ.

Have a great weekend walking and spreading LOVE!

Where is God?

That’s a good question in these troubled times. It’s easy to question where God is and why does He let all this bad stuff happen in the world. It’s even easy to question the existence of God. And that’s exactly what the forces of evil want you to do. Question, doubt, and simply walk away.

Look. God is always there and a heartbeat away. We just need to turn to Him. But like the Israelites in the desert thousands of years ago it’s easier to turn away from God. To doubt. To complain. To worship false idols. And look where that got them. Not even Moses crossed into the Promised Land. Only two of the original tribe did.

It this earth was all there is then I would certainly question God and His existence. But this earth, with all our imperfections and the forces of evil constantly in our ear, is not all there is. It’s a training ground, a warm-up to eternity. I know that may sound just too pat, but what can I say. It’s true. Think about this, we die and at the moment of death there is nothing. Or, at the moment of death, we either see a shining light or a very dark place. And everything we have done to make this imperfect world Heaven on earth will dictate if we see light or dark. If we see nothing then it’s game over. I’m banking on seeing something and I want to see light.

Every day we have choices to make. We can LOVE as God our Creator and Jesus our Savior both commanded or we can live for just ourselves. It’s a pretty simple choice. We live for today for ourselves or we live for today and tomorrow for others. We make this world a worse place or improve it for the better.

Game on!

Do You LOVE?

It’s clear that God is LOVE. Pure, unconditional LOVE. He sent His only Son to sacrifice Himself for our sins. Before His humanity died on the cross, Jesus gave us the one commandment to LOVE. The question is, do we LOVE?

LOVE is just like electricity. It has to flow. Without flowing, LOVE is nothing. God flows His LOVE into us, but the question is do we flow it to others?

Here’s a news flash. If you think you are a Christian—meaning, a follower of Jesus Christ—and you don’t walk in LOVE, you are simply not a Christian. I don’t know what you are but you are certainly not a Christian.

There is a profound lack of LOVE in this world today. There is a lot more animosity and downright hate in the world. LOVE is hard to come by. That’s why we have daily shootings and wars breaking out all over the globe. To LOVE is a Real Secret to Life but it’s more of an unknown than ever before.

You’re on a path to hell if you don’t walk in LOVE. It’s that simple. LOVE and you’re walking the path to eternity. Sorry. There is no sugar coating this.

I hope you walk in LOVE this week, the next, and so on.