Deeper Things

  John 13:34-35: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” There are many ideas of what true love is. You probably have a thought about what real love looks like. Maybe you think of sitting on a quiet beach with your spouse overlooking God's enormous ocean? Or you imagine meeting that perfect person one day. Maybe true love for you is when others accept you for who you believe you are.    Agape Love and the Nature of God The Bible uses "agape" love to describe God's unconditional love for us. John uses this word in our key verse to describe how we are called to love one another. Romans 5:8 illustrates agape love when Paul writes, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Even though God knew we would betray Him with our continuing sin, He still loved us by sending Jesu...

1 Corinthians 13:13- "And now these three remain:  faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love." This series of devotions presents love as the unprecedented, counter-cultural force that enables us to love our families, friends,  communities, and world just as God has loved us. My goal is for us to dig deep into our lives to love like Jesus demonstrated love. He changed the world by His love. He loved the untouchable when they didn't deserve to be loved. He scorned the hypocritical for loving with strings attached. He illuminated the unconditional Love of God for the world.  The church in America has been conditioned to think that our faith represents our best chance to reach our world. If you turn on Christian television, you will find preachers who communicate a Gospel narrative that highlights the power of faith. I do not deny Jesus' powerful teaching that corroborates faith's power. For instance, Matthew 17:20, Jesus taught, "if you have faith...

Genesis 3:8-9: "Then the man and his wife heard  the sound of the Lord God  as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day,  and they hid from the Lord God among the trees  of the garden.  But the Lord God called to the man,  'Where are you?'" As an educator, I was taught how to ask questions. That may seem odd if you don't spend a lot of time in a classroom with students, but there is a right way to ask a question. Let me illustrate this with a story. I did my student teaching during my last semester of college. I taught seventh grade World Geography during Operation Desert Storm. I remember many of my students talking about parents or siblings who had been called to serve in that conflict. Naturally, we spent a lot of time learning about the geography of the Middle East.  Overall I was successful with student teaching. However, I remember my supervising teacher giving me a good piece of advice. She said, "Todd, when you ask a question, you ne...

  1   Corinthians 2:10: "The Spirit searches all things, even the deep  things of God." Several years ago my wife surprised me with an adventure she had planned for both of us. She had signed us up for scuba diving lessons! While I am very comfortable in water, I have never entertained the thought of breathing while underwater. After the lesson, I admitted to my wife that I had more fun than I thought I would.  I had an interesting observation when I was scuba diving. I saw the surface of the water from a different vantage point. The surface looked different. It was safer. The surface was where I normally wanted to be, but once I went deeper, I wanted to stay there. There was a feeling of mystery and wonder in the depths.  Surface Level Christianity vs. Christianity in the Depths The Bible distinguishes between what I call surface level Christianity and Christianity in the depths. Notice 1 Corinthians 2:10 again: "The Spirit searches all things, even the d...

1 Corinthians 7:35: "I say this for your own benefit, not to put a restraint on you, but to    promote what is appropriate and to  secure undistracted devotion to the Lord." The Apostle Paul introduced the principle of  undistracted devotion as  an aim for everyday life. Have you ever t hought that it may be possible to live for the Lord without  distractions? I used to teach special education. Almost all of the students I served had a variety of issues that prevented them from learning. While their problems varied, though, there was one problem all of them shared on some level. They struggled with focusing their attention for a normal period of time for their age and development.  I have found their problem looks like the problem of many followers of Jesus. We struggle to follow Jesus without becoming distracted. I have often wondered what undistracted devotion looks like because my life is so full of distractions.  The Pattern of the Undistracte...