DAY 8:
GOD IS LOVE

Love is the most miscontrued, misused and misapplied word in the world!  Our focus today is not to dwell on and dissect all the different types of love in humanity, but to zero in on this characteristic of our Holy and Loving God!

As I mentioned yesterday, we cannot separate the Attribute from the Name of God. Many throw around the statement “GOD IS LOVE” very loosely to cover a wide variety of behaviors and philosophies – mostly non-Christian!

But we, who are called by His Name, are required to get it  correctly, right off the bat. Therefore,  let us key into the selected passage for today”

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

(1 John 4:7-10 ESV)

As you see, the Apostle John uses the word “LOVE” many times in these few verses!  All of these words are from the same root word for Divine Love – Agape!

Agape is the HIGHEST form of Love a human being can have for another human being.

It is a selfless, unconditional and sacrificial love for another. 

It is the kind of love which forgives another when they have wronged us. 

It is the kind of love which so fills our hearts that we wish everyone to have a close walk with Jesus too, so that they too can go to Heaven. 

It is the kind of love we have for our children that we want to raise them up in the way that they should go, so that when they are older, they will not depart from it.

It is the kind of love which could cause us to give up this mortal life to our persecutors, who will soon be at our doors in the coming Tribulation.

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What if we had more time in a day to git ‘er done, would we?
What if we had one more dime in the parking meter, would we have gotten that parking ticket?
What if we had one more mime on the street corner in July, would we welcome the sound of jackhammers?
What if?

What if we had filled up the tank on the way to work, right before Sheik Abdul sneezed and gas shot up 45 cents a gallon?
What if we had just been cussed out by a guy named Frank, but still gave the cashier a credit card-sized tract which looked like a “Facebook” logo with a Friend Request that reminded her “What a Friend we have in Jesus”?
What if we had just gotten that one last prayer in for uncle Joe, who was in Hospice Care but thinks he was good enough to get into Heaven because he never killed anyone….well except for that bridge he blew up in Viet Nam…and the er…secret mission to Cambodia…???!!!
What if?

You get the point!
Life is sometimes a series of missed opportunities. It happens to everyone at the most crucial moment. How many times have we said “aw man…I should have said…..” or “why didn’t I mention……” or “if I get the chance to tell….I will….” ad nauseum!

2011, THE YEAR THAT’S NO MORE:
This past year was no different. Looking back on what ain’t no more, we see:
– Blizzard on Groundhog Day (February 2, 2011) which shut down the Midwest and took the life of a 55 year old friend of mine, who went shovelling two feet of snow with a bad heart.
– Tidal Wave shown live on worldwide TV in March….as many of us watched in horror as thousands died lost forever to eternity in a split second, because they did not know the One True God.
– A monster mile-wide tornado took out Tuscaloosa, Alabama  in April which they still have not recovered from.
– A similar set of violent tornadoes almost completely destroyed Joplin, Mo, about 6 hours from where we live. But unlike the other natural disasters, we were able to mobilize truckloads of food, water, clothing and money to help love on these dear people, who lost everything except their Hope!
– The St. Louis Cardinals, hot on the heels of one of the biggest Christian Days at the Ball Park in August, win the 2011 Baseball World Series in some of the best baseball ever played.
– Yet we had spectacles of spoiled rich kids armed with Apple iPads, iPhones and more electronics you can shake a stick at, “OCCUPYING” every major city in America, causing havoc, lost of income and disease by living in 1960’s styled communes…complete with illicit sex and violence!

But then we had the Tim Tebow phenomenon!

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