Tuesday 27 February 2018

Love your neighbour

It's easy to love the neighbour who's quiet and no trouble, maybe who even helps out and sends you a Christmas card. But what about the neighbour who's banging around through the night and has screaming matches through the day? Whose antisocial behaviour makes you feel like tearing your hair out? It's not easy to love those whom we don't like or who annoy and upset us. 
Then, when you think about it, sometimes it's hard enough to love our own family let alone anyone else, so why love our neighbours?

When asked about the greatest commandment, Jesus says in Mark 12:30-31, "you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

So, Jesus says, love God first, then your neighbours. These commandments are the top priority. Jesus doesn't say to just love them a little bit, you know just say Hi once a day, that's enough, no Jesus says we are to love them as ourself. 
Some of you may think, 'well I don't love myself, I barely like myself somedays'. However - do you you eat? Sleep? Do you take care of your basic needs? These are ways of practically loving yourself. 
One thing we overemphasise in our culture is the 'feeling' of love. We might not feel like we love ourselves, or our neighbours, but Jesus in these verses tells us to do it. We can't rely on a feeling, an emotion. It must be about action. 

So, how can you show love to your neighbours regardless of whether you want to or not? How can you make them smile or lessen their burden? Could you put out their rubbish? Feed their cat whilst they are away? Or even go round for a cuppa to the lonely person across the street?

Love your neighbour, why? Because Jesus said so! 

Wednesday 21 February 2018

Treacherous journey

Acts 27 describes Paul, who is now a prisoner, onboard a ship. This chapter describes the journey. After just setting sail for their destination they encounter a storm, described like a hurricane force storm. That must of been terrifying! It's likely that there were almost 300 people onboard, all probably scared for their lives. The account says they were so scared and invested in saving the ship as well as their lives, that they didn't eat for 14 days. Even then they only ate because Paul initiated it.

So scared that you don't eat for two weeks, wow! Plus they have literally tried to tie the boat together so it doesn't fall apart, they've chucked things overboard, gone off course and they haven't known whether it's daylight or night because no sun, moon or stars have been visible for days. No wonder they forgot to eat! I would imagine panic is reigning aboard that ship right now. 
Panic and prayer to whatever gods people believe in, saying goodbyes to each other because their situation seems helpless. 
They've totally abandoned and forgotten the intended destination because it's enough trouble trying to stay upright let alone alive.

Have you ever felt like you've encountered a time like this in your life? Maybe you're even in it right now. 

A situation where you have an intended outcome and are going after it, but a raging storm comes, that causes you to; battle, abandon things, and may even may endanger your life? You forget to eat, sleep, look after yourself because of the peril of the circumstances. You're stuck in a raging storm, panic rising, not knowing where this is taking you. It certainly doesn't seem to be the destination you're looking for.

Then along comes the voice of Paul. He has heard God in the midst of it. He has kept his faith. He has called on God and God has answered. God has said no lives will be lost, and Paul will reach that destination. Now, the destination was reached in a round-about way, but Paul got there. 

This is a promise for you if you're in a storm. If you know God has given you a destination, a goal, an achievement to go after, yet the waves are billowing, the clouds are obscuring the view, then keep focused. Keep the faith you have, wait for the voice to speak in the storm and take care of yourself. 


The destination is coming.

Wednesday 14 February 2018

The greatest love


As today is Valentines Day, it seems appropriate to talk about love.

I’m not going to talk about warm fuzzy boy meets girl love though. If that’s the love you’re looking for then you’re aiming to low.

There’s a love that is bigger, that is greater, that will never let you down, that will never leave you or hurt you.
This is a love that NEVER fails. This love never runs away, cheats, abuses or deceives you.

This love is; constant, faithful, will always desire you, it will not reject you even when you mess up. This love is always there, always ready for you to accept it. This love remains. This love is tough - it can stand up for you and up to you. This love loves you despite your weaknesses. This love will never end. This love loves you completely and without fail.

If you want this kind of love - the greatest love you could ever experience, then today, as we celebrate love, accept Jesus into your life.
God is the source of this everlasting, abiding love. He loves us all like this, whether you know it or not. He even loves you when you’ve gone wrong and hurt people. He will forgive you if you ask Him to, and then you can experience for yourself the greatest love available. The love that will never fail.

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.’
Lamentations 3:20

What are you waiting for? Reach out and grab the love that’s awaiting you.

Wednesday 7 February 2018

Hopelessly hopeful

Now, has anyone ever felt the way the author of Lamentations does in these verses below?:

'He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;
he has made my chains heavy;
though I call and cry for help,
he shuts out my prayer;
he has blocked my ways with blocks of stones;
he has made my paths crooked.

He is a bear lying in wait for me,
a lion in hiding;
he turned aside my steps and tore me to pieces;
he has made me desolate;
he bent his bow and set me
as a target for his arrow.

He drove into my kidneys
the arrows of his quiver;
I have become the laughingstock of all peoples,
the object of their taunts all day long.
He has filled me with bitterness;
he has sated me with wormwood

He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
and made me cower in ashes;
my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness is;
so I say, “My endurance has perished;
so has my hope from the Lord.”

Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul“therefore I will hope in him.”

The Lord is good to those who wait for him,
to the soul who seeks him.
It is good that one should wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord.
It is good for a man that he bear
the yoke in his youth.

Let him sit alone in silence
when it is laid on him;
let him put his mouth in the dust—
there may yet be hope;
let him give his cheek to the one who strikes,
and let him be filled with insults.

For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love'
Lamentations 3:7-32

Ever felt like that? Utterly bereft? Not knowing what to do or what's coming next? Not sure if there is hope for improvement because of the dire situation you're in? 

I read this at the weekend and could resonate with this. There are some problems that I don't know how to overcome, the struggle in our household is real and really difficult. I feel desperate. God isn't allowing us to escape this trial. We are having to walk through it. It's really, really difficult. It's emotionally draining and I feel like I'm going in circles. I feel exasperated and desperate. Where is God in all this?

Have you ever had a situation where you feel like this? Maybe you're in one right now.
I'm feeling like this, and I would consider myself an optimist! 

I read this section in Lamentations, and bizarrely it helped. Other people feel desperate, alone and hopeless too.
I like the verses where the writer says that they have no hope, then a few lines later that they do have hope. I think I understand that. In myself, I have nothing more. I have nothing more to give, and what I do have is not enough. Therefore I have no more hope in myself. I am at the end of what I can do. I am hopeless. So where do I go from here? In the middle of all this I have to do my best, as this writer does, to remember who God is. 

Our situations can knock us sideways, they can kick us whilst we are down, they can cause us to doubt who we are, but, whatever is happening in your life, please remember not who you are, but who God is. 
Who He is never changes, He is good, He is strong, He is, 'good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.'

So, in the hopelessness and desperation, you can keep going. Wait for Him, seek Him. There is hope even if resolution seems far off:

For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion

according to the abundance of his steadfast love'