SOTL – Podcast – E17 – What Do Christians Need to Do More of?

Today’s episode comes from my heart, it comes from a concern I have right now, a concern that I have been in prayer about daily.

So, What do Christians Need to Do More of? Love Each Other

God is very concerned with Love. 1 John 4:16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.

Not only is God concerned with Love but God IS Love! If we want to live a life full of God, if we want to dwell with God, then we need to dwell in Love. The more love we have in us, the more God will be able to dwell with us.

God wants us to be full of love, He wants us to live a life, that is full of love. God wants us to show love to others, that means our family, our friends, our fellow church members, strangers we see and even our enemies. So, to sum it all up, we are to show love to everyone!

Now, WHY should we love each other and show each other love? Jesus said in… John 13:34-35 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

Jesus commands us to show love. If you desire to be a disciple or follower of Jesus then you will want to obey His commands and this one is very clear, we need to love one another!

Another great motivation to show love to others is… the well-being of others. Showing love to others will benefit them, and that should make us happy, and it should help us and motivate us to show love to others even if they don’t deserve it.

Let’s be honest… That is the hard part. Showing love to someone that doesn’t deserve it may be one of the hardest things to do.

In Matthew chapter 18 we see Jesus teaching, Jesus starts talking about when a brother in Christ does something wrong to you and how we are to act during that time. First Jesus says in Matthew 18:15 Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother.

This is to make sure that the issue gets resolved and also so that no other brothers or sisters in Christ get hurt along the way, as well. Not doing things in this proper way and order will cause pain and hurt to others and that is not obeying Jesus’ command to love one another.

After discussing the issue of a brother offending you, Peter comes to Jesus, and asks Jesus Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?

Jesus’ answer to this question if obeyed, will cause us to show love to one another just like He commanded. Jesus says in Matthew 18:22 I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

Yes, showing love to someone who does not deserve it is hard, maybe the hardest thing we will do, but it is necessary if we want to be obedient to Jesus’ teachings. Jesus is the best example to us and really Jesus is who we are aiming to live like, right?

John 15:12 This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you. We are to love each other the exact same way that Jesus loves us. This is true love, sacrificial love!

1 John 3:16 Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. God came down as Jesus and laid down everything for us and we are told to be willing to do the same for our Christian brothers and sisters.

To truly love one another we have to be willing to stop at nothing, for the benefit of our brothers and sisters. We have to be willing to show them love even when it is hard, even if they do not deserve it. Even if they wronged us, I know this sounds impossible and on our own it is but through Christ this IS possible because nothing is too hard for God!

One of the greatest benefits of showing love to one another is the ability to have peace in our lives and to dwell in unity in the family of God!

David said it best in Psalms 133:1 Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! This really is true. There is a wonderful feeling of peace and happiness that comes with the family of God dwelling together in unity!

Paul talks about the expectation of unity in the body of Christ in Ephesians chapter 4. Paul says there is One Lord, one Spirit, one Father, one God, and one body… That last one is us; we are the body of Christ and there is only one body, not one for each church or group of people, no, just one. Any one who put their faith and trust in Jesus as their personal Saviour is my brother or sister and we are in the same family, the family of God.

We need to love each other all the time, even the times that I make it hard for you to love me. I’m not perfect and I may at times, make it hard for you to love me. That doesn’t mean I can do whatever I want and you just have to keep letting me go on and do those things and keep on loving me.

We already talked about this, Jesus told us how to deal with issues and we need to make sure we do that properly, but during the whole process and after we need to love each other and show each other love.

I challenge us all… we need to love each other more! We must stop at nothing, we must go out of our way, we must take the first step, we must be willing to go the extra mile, we must be willing to do what ever it takes for us to show each other love! This may seem too hard or even impossible, but this impossible task is made possible through Jesus Christ.

Let’s rely on the power and example of Christ to show each other more love

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