This is a read-aloud of this devotion.
Oswald Chambers is an author that has made a tremendous impact upon my life. 18 years ago, I read through: “My Utmost for His Highest” - a devotion that is a collection on his spoken devotions, which he offered as a Chaplain during World War I. When I worked at Baker Middle School, I read through the devotion during my lunch-break and, as I read, I would just weep, because I was falling in love with God’s Word. When I got married, my friend, Mike Hare, gifted me with Oswald Chambers’ Complete Works. Throughout my life, I have been working through the book, which brings me to today’s devotion. Currently, I am reading through a book Chambers wrote called: “Our Brilliant Heritage - Growing Up into Him.” In this book, he makes the point that the love of God cannot be found in our natural hearts, rather that the love of God is solely the work of the Holy Spirit in and through our lives. He then offers “three springs” of God’s love that flow out of hearts regenerated by the Holy Spirit:
Love Where You Cannot Respect: “But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8)!
Love Where You are Not Respected: “For what credit is there if you sin and are punished, and you endure it? But when you do what is good and suffer, if you endure it, this brings favor with God. For you were called to this, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in His steps” ( I Peter 2:20-21).
Love Wherever Redemption Reaches: “For God loved the world in this way: He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world that He might condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:16-17).
For our time together, let’s reflect on each of these “springs of Christ’s love.” Below, are points of reflection and passages that provide for our discussion upon each point.
LOVE WHERE YOU CANNOT RESPECT
God’s love in us does not simply help us love other people that we find friendly, or familiar, or family-like. The love of God enables us to deepen our love for those that we like BUT also compels us to love those that we do not like, too. “You have heard that it was said, Love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. For He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward will you have? Don’t even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing out of the ordinary? Don’t even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:43-48).
DISCUSS
Discuss a time in your life that you’ve chosen to love someone you struggled to respect.
LOVE WHERE YOU ARE NOT RESPECTED
God’s love enables us to love a person who has offended or violated us. It’s this spring that requires the most of our prayer life. In the face of violation, I know I am constantly asking the Lord to show me how to love my offender in a way that honors His name. In matters like this, I often think of Hannah, who was the mother of the prophet, Samuel. Unable to have a child, she was laughed at and ridiculed by another woman. She then goes to the temple to pray. In her anguish, she asks the Lord for a son but only that her purpose (having a son) may exalt the name and purposes of the Lord. Leaving her request before the Lord, she then offers her son to serve the Lord all the days of His life. Her offense becomes an offering of praise to the Lord.
DISCUSS
Discuss how we can seek to honor our Lord by loving someone who does not respect us.
LOVE WHEREVER REDEMPTION REACHES
It is so easy for us to write our secret qualifications for who should receive the love of God and who shouldn’t. When we read the Bible, we quickly learn that our qualifications for who God should love fall terribly short of His redeeming love. Jonah comes to mind for me. Jonah did not think the Ninevites were worthy of the grace and love of God. So much so, that when God told Jonah to go to Ninevah and preach repentance, he ran the opposite direction of Ninevah. Jonah believed their barbaric practices should disqualify them from God’s grace. I guess being in the belly of a whale for three days has a way of changing your perspective. Once Jonah obeyed and offered the barbaric nation of Nineveh the Lord’s message of judgment and mercy found through repentance, the people of Nineveh responded by turning from their evil ways and God redeemed them.
“When word reached the king of Nineveh, he got up from his throne, took off his royal robe, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes. Then he issued a decree in Nineveh: By order of the king and his nobles: No man or beast, herd or flock, is to taste anything at all. They must not eat or drink water. Furthermore, both man and beast must be covered with sackcloth, and everyone must call out earnestly to God. Each must turn from his evil ways and from the violence he is doing. Who knows? God may turn and relent; He may turn from His burning anger so that we will not perish.”
“Then God saw their actions — that they had turned from their evil ways — so God relented from the disaster He had threatened to do to them. And He did not do it.”
(Jonah 3:6-10, HCSB)
Jonah was then agitated with the Lord because He offered his redeeming love to the people of Nineveh.
"But Jonah was greatly displeased and became furious. He prayed to the Lord: “Please, Lord, isn’t this what I said while I was still in my own country? That’s why I fled toward Tarshish in the first place. I knew that You are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to become angry, rich in faithful love, and One who relents from sending disaster.”
(Jonah 4:1-2, HCSB)
Redemption is defined as the release from the consequences of the offense for the person who committed the offense. The redemption of God reaches ANYONE who repents, declaring Jesus as Lord.
DISCUSS & PRAY
We are in the midst of troubling times within our world and specifically, right now, within our nation. These times compel us, Highland, to offer the gospel-message of redeeming love, repentance, and unfailing mercy, in Christ alone.
Discuss how some of the current events within our nation can serve to remind us that, as Christians, we are to love wherever redemption reaches.
Discuss ways that we can "live out” that message in our words and in our actions.
Highland tribe, let us remain a people of prayer, a spirit-filled people seeking to love others as God loves us. This is absolutely not something we are capable of doing in and of ourselves. We must be on our knees regularly, praying for more power from the Holy Spirit and for more of His guidance and direction, as we navigate these uncertain times.
Close your time today by praying, as a family, asking the Holy Spirit to empower you to love those whom you struggle to respect, to love even when you are not respected and to always offer others the far-reaching, redeeming love of the Lord.
Sourced by : Superbook
We love you,
Rob & Carrie