Last one! I’m not giving a full week for this one, because I
want to get it out before school starts! I’m really excited for school and how
God’s going to use and guide me this year, and I’m excited to share all of that
with you guys!
Generous
Okay, so “generous” is a bit of a weird term to apply to
God. He gives good things to those who ask. It is us who should be generous with what God has given us.
Clarification, in case anyone was confused.
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he
who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
Which of you, if his
son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give
him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to
your children, how much more will your Father in Heaven give good gifts to
those who ask Him!” –Matthew 7:7-11
This is kind of a weird way to explain how we should be like
God, but I don’t believe in doing things the normal way. J
This is part of the Sermon on the Mount; it’s Jesus talking. He promises
essentially that if we seek God and ask things according to His plan, He will
give them to us. He gives good gifts to those who ask.
Unfortunately, truly giving gifts requires one thing:
selflessness. That’s not something I have in great supply. For my part, gift
giving is largely restricted to birthdays and Christmas. But what about the
simpler gifts; the ones we should give on a regular basis? Love and
encouragement are two that I often neglect to give freely. We all love to be
complimented, but if none of us take the time to give compliments, how can we
receive them? Sometimes, I think we need to pay attention not to what is asked
outright-“can I have the salt, please”-but what is asked indirectly. Have you
ever just felt really low, and suddenly someone just out of the blue came up
and said “wow; your hair looks really fantastic today; how in the world did you
get it to stay like that?” or some similar comment, and they’ve somehow managed
to say just the right thing to make you feel a little better? Maybe it’s
because they listened to what your heart was asking, even if you didn’t voice
it.
Of course, this goes to giving actual gifts, too. You never
know what will happen when you give up your self-centred concerns in favour of
generosity until you try it. And it goes FAR beyond our circle of friends. We
can give innumerable gifts to people in third-world countries, people who have
been begging for help for decades.
And though I’ve never done this myself, I’ve heard that people who really take
that step and fulfill that need are viewed as absolutely beautiful by the
people they have helped. And the more you become like Christ, giving to those
who ask and reaching for the poor, the more beautiful you become on the inside.
Merciful
This goes back to the whole being hurt thing I talked about
in my last post. I on my own am a very vengeful person. “Forgive and forget”
doesn’t come naturally to me. But what if someone came to me and asked my
forgiveness for something they’d done to hurt me? Would I be merciful?
I want to say yes. Really, I do. But it would be hard. The
New Oxford American Dictionary (courtesy of my iPhone) defines “mercy” as
“compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one’s power
to punish or harm.” God is certainly merciful. He extends His mercy and grace
to all of us, because we are all sinners who deserve to be punished, and God is
more than capable of doing so. Sometimes it’s hard to forgive. For me, mercy
has to come first. I have to decide that I’m not going to attempt to “punish” a
person, but it may be weeks before I have truly forgiven them in my heart, and
the Lord is working in my heart to change me into a more forgiving person, but
the point is that we are to extend the same mercy that God has extended to us,
just like in the parable of the unmerciful
servant, as it is labeled in my NIV. I happen to know from meeting a few that
girls who are always out to get you, who refuse to be merciful or forgive, are
rarely well-liked or admired, and while the admiration of other’s isn’t
necessarily what we should aspire to, it plays a role. You can’t be beautiful
if you’re always out to get someone; spreading rumours and gossiping and trying
to steal her boyfriend. It just makes you bitter. It won’t fill you. But Christ
can.
Loving
Always save the best for last, and I think I have. “How
great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we might be called
children of God! And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1) “We know that we have
passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not
love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know
that no murderer has eternal life in him. This is how we know what love is:
Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for
our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need
but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let
us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” -1 John
3:14-20
That was a long passage; sorry. I love 1 John. Love is the
greatest commandment; the entire New Testament is about love! Love your
neighbour, love your enemy, love your brother as yourself, love the Lord your
God above everything else. Love, love, love. And yet every day I see and hear
of people who claim to be in Christ and yet are not loving toward each other or
toward those who do not yet believe. “Anyone who hates his brother is a
murderer.” The Bible doesn’t skirt around this at all. Jesus loved us. And we are called to love one another. If we don’t,
we’re no better off than anyone else.
Let’s boil it down: it’s not about the rules. In 17 ⅔ years
of living on this earth, I have had so many people throw so many rules in my
face that I don’t even know what to do with them all. But Jesus didn’t come and
die to convince us to follow the rules. He came because of love. If we truly believe in His sacrifice, shouldn’t we also do
the same? I talked about giving gifts to those who ask; does not every human
heart cry out for love? What greater gift could we then give but to love them
and share with them the love of God, so that they will know and be satisfied?
Please allow me to clarify. Having a boyfriend who holds you
and tells you you’re beautiful is not love. I’m not here to judge your
relationships; that’s between you and God. But the world defines love all
wrong. Love is sacrifice; it is selfless. And it is beautiful. We are beautiful when we choose to love.
God made us to be beautiful and he made us to love. The first is dependent on
the second. It doesn’t matter what you do or how you look or what you wear or
who you are; without love we are nothing.
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