~~~ 1 John 4:19-5:4 ~~~ Psalm 72 ~~~ Luke 4:14-22 ~~~
Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.
We continue to be reminded to adore God every day in every way.
Our adoration of God is not restricted to Sunday worship.
Our adoration of God is not restricted to a specific time of prayer.
We can adore God is all that we say and do.
It is a matter of anchoring the intention to your heart.
John is using strong words to impress upon us
today the finer points of loving.
'...for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen
cannot love God whom he has not seen.'
cannot love God whom he has not seen.'
Your spoken words of love for God are just hallow and empty
if you cannot love your neighbors.
If we go about condemning our sisters and brothers
and then sit in church feeling all holy;
who are we trying to convince of our love.
God did not say, it is acceptable to chose who you want to love.
He never said if you love those who agree with you that is enough.
God's love has no qualifiers;
his love for just is.
God loves the one who curses and despises him.
God cannot not love.
God is love; he cannot remove it from his essence.
Our ability to love comes directly from God's ability to love us.
When we love someone we are tapping into God's love of us.
If we do not love we are ignoring the very love
that brought us into existence.
Granted, sometimes we must make a conscious effort
to draw from the spirit of God's love.
Not all people we come in contact with are lovable;
that goes without saying.
Jesus was raised in a very traditional Jewish home;
so it would not have been unusual
for him to read from the scroll while in the temple.
What was astounding on this particular day
was the passage he read.
Today the reader, Jesus, was reading the prophetic text
about himself.
He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written:The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring glad tidings to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
because he has anointed me
to bring glad tidings to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
Of course all present would have been blown away.
Astounded was probably not a strong enough word
to express their reactions.
Jesus gives credit to the Spirit of the Lord.
He is saying...listen whatever you witness in the near future
it is the spirit who has anointed me.
It is the spirit that is working through me.
They could not grasp the concept
that he was the one they were waiting for...
right there standing before them.
It is sad in a way; they were blind to the prophecies.
It was as if Jesus was camouflaged.
Jesus was emerging right from the Old Testament text.
The Word became flesh!
He blended is so well with the scriptures
they could not tell him apart,
thus ignoring the possibility that the Messiah
was in their midst.
Lord, allow me to love like you even when you are
hiding in plain sight.
How often I have missed the opportunity
to love my brother or sister.
Give me the strength to draw from your first love.
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