Larry Beckett, a youthful evangelical minister once said, "I think most people are selfish, and when they're looking at relationships romantically, they're primarily looking at it for themselves only. And the Scriptures are diametrically opposed to that. They would say, and I would teach, that there is a love that we can have for other people that is generally selfless. I am super selfish. No joke. It's all about what I want and what I need. This has to happen on my time and you should do this because I think its best. me me me and more me please. How gross...? How do I fix this??
We have to learn it. It's actually a matter of the will. I have to decided to go out and love people by action and by will for their own good. Not because I enjoy it all the time, but because God commands it." Jesus says, Love your enemies. That's one of His famous sayings. When he said that, He wasn't commanding my emotions or affections, because He can't. But He can command my will and my decision process and my actions, if I allow Him to. Love thus becomes a matter of will and action rather than of feelings. While one cannot coerce one's feelings one can learn to obey God's commands and to love others in a selfless way. Through training and shaping the will, I can come to want to do what I must do. People can see their lives as a process of changing, in which they become "less selfish" as they accept "Christ as the standard" and "His ethics as their ethics. and they do that out of a desire to, not out of any compulsion. Their love for God becomes then the motivational source for loving other people. In Christian love, free choice and duty can be combined, but it is obligation that comes first. Love is not simply a matter of feeling. It is also not expressed primarily in internal, emotional form, but in action. The Bible says if you love in just lip service and not in action then you're a hypocrite. Love means putting other's interests ahead of one's own. The most important examples of love come when conflicts of interest are the most intense. When conflicts arise my first thoughts are about what I want or need. Its about me. But I then think about all the conflicts of interest that God must have faced when dealing with his fallen sinful people. And what did He do, He sent His only son so that we could have eternal life. Love is when another's needs are greater than your own. It is rather, a willingness to sacrifice oneself for others. I think about my own life and if I have ever sacrificed myself for someone I love or better yet someone I don't even like? I haven't even sacrificed myself a little. I say that I want to follow Christ but I realize more that I am more willing to serve him than to follow him because that seems less painful. At least when I serve God I get some kind of good feeling out of it...again..its about me. You know that famous verse John 3:16. Its a great verse but you know an even better verse 1 John 3:16-18. It says, "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 and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth." Love is a choice and I want to make the choice to love regardless of the circumstance. regardless of the circumstance....God is love. Amen? Amen...:)
