As the end of month three nears, and we start the trek to Albania, I am revisited by what all has happened and what’s to come.
So what’s happened, you may be asking? Have thousands of people come to Christ?! Did you pray over bread and fish and Jesus multiply it to feed a bunch of people?! Did you pray over a dead person and they become alive?!
No….but what has happened has been even more impactful than that. I have spent 3 months with a group of people who have frustrated me, surprised me, and loved me. I have been to Ecuador, where ministry looked completely different everyday. I’ve been to Peru, where I got to minister and be ministered to by the youth of Laredo. And now, I have been to Bolivia, where I have been with 17 of the cutest, brattiest, craziest, lice infected, loving orphans I have ever been around.
So what exactly has happened? I am doing what God has called me to do…what He has called us all to do. Love Him with everything and THEN love my neighbor as I love myself (Matthew 22:37-40). I’m not doing this for a show, or to try and earn my way into heaven. I’m not doing this because I “have” to because that’s what God says to do. I am doing this because God has transformed my heart so much that I actually love people!
Too often we want some big production from God. We feel that if something “crazy” doesn’t happen then something is either wrong or we have failed somehow. John 10:41-42 says, “Though John never performed a miraculous sign, all that John said about this man was true. And in that place many believed in Jesus”.
John never performed some miraculous sign. He lived in the desert eating locust and honey. His clothing was made from camel’s hair. And yet he preached and believed like none other. He loved people so much! He welcomed any and everyone and baptized thousands of people with water.
This makes me wonder….If I never see a miraculous sign, will that be ok? Will God still be God? Yes! I don’t need those signs to believe. God is still the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. He is Good….He is Love!
So what’s to come? I’ll tell you exactly….Love, grace, forgiveness, and even more love. Not just the rest of this trip, but for the rest of my life. God has called us to love Him with everything and to love our neighbor as ourselves.
I don’t care who or what your neighbor is. God has called us to love. I don’t care about sexual orientation, social class, skin color, religion, job title, how “good” or “bad” a person is. God has called us to love.
You know what would be a miracle? If we befriended homosexuals, drunkards, addicts, people of other religions, people who have had abortions, with no other intentions than to love them. We befriend them because we truly want to, because we truly see them as friends and not projects. That when we talk to them about Jesus they don’t feel condemnation but they feel love, freedom, and a person who truly cares for them! The ONLY way to do that is to establish a loving relationship with them first.
The crazy thing about true love is that it can’t be faked. People recognize when someone doesn’t truly care for them. Why do you think so many people feel burned by the church? We are supposed to be the people who follow Christ! The people who show mercy, show grace, who love like no other beings. We are supposed to be the light in the world. Did the drunkards, prostitutes, homosexuals, even tax collectors feel burned by Jesus? Absolutely not! They loved Him because He was the only one who truly loved them!
If we could stop putting ourselves up on a pedestal thinking we are better than everyone because we believe in Jesus, because guess what? That’s exactly what the Jews did. They are God’s people and yet they were so blind that they couldn’t recognize who Jesus was! If we could just love people the way Jesus loved people, how different would our world be?
It’s time to wake up…its time to start living like Christ. It’s time to start loving like Him! Stop pursuing miracles, stop pursuing the gifts of the Spirit, stop trying to make numbers in church, stop trying and just start loving. When we can start doing that then everything else will happen. When we start loving people come to Christ, Jesus presents us with miraculous signs, people are healed, the dead rise, church attendance sky rockets, finances are taken care of, families are made whole, marriages are made whole, people are changed forever!
But this can only happen when we start doing two things…
Loving God with everything…and then loving our neighbor as we love ourselves…
