1If I speak in the tongues[a] of men and of angels, but haveAs my fellow church members found out about my mom's stroke, they went out of their way to seek Jina or I out on Sunday morning and express their concern and offer their prayers. We were both shocked by the number of people who knew of her illness and who had been enlisted by others to pray for her and our family.
not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift
of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a
faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I
possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,[b] but have not love, I
gain nothing.
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not
boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not
easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but
rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes,
always perseveres.
8Love never fails... 13And now these three remain:
faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
As you can see by the comments in my last post, some who visit here have also offered up their prayers, as have some of my coworkers. Guess what, they all aren't Southern Baptist. Guess what, they may or may not agree with me on doctrinal issues. But guess what, they all know Jesus Christ, and they know how to love.
In Corinthians chapter 13 Paul instructs that love is the core of everything that Christ taught and preached, that even faith is useless without love. There are many things I can not do, there are many areas in which I may falter, but the one thing that I can do, as a Christian the one thing I must do, is love.
Why am I writing this? Because in my opinion, we, as Christians, need to set aside our differences and learn to pray and fellowship together. I left a church, where we were loved, over doctrinal concerns. I don't regret it, God led us to a wonderful new church home, but I can no longer say without a doubt that it was necessary. There is a world full of lost and dying people and we are too busy concerning ourselves over which one of our denominations has it "right" to be effective in reaching them. Are the Methodist fully grounded in the Bible? Are the Episcopalians going to "hell in a hand basket"? Who knows?
As a child we sung a song in youth group that had the verse, "Well it want be Baptist that's sitting on the throne. A Presbyterian or a Methodist that's calling us home. No it won't be a Charasmatic that plays that trumpet tune. Were going to see the Son..." I'm not sure everyone agrees with this, a lot of throne polishing, voice lessons, and trumpet practice seems to take place on this side of the pearly gates.
I think the question to ask is, "Where does a persons heart lie?" Do they trust that Christ can save them? Do they love their fellow man? Maybe the theologians can decipher whether anything beyond this matters? As for me, I'm not sure that I need to know anything more.
When my family is in need, my Christian friends of all denominations offer up their prayers on our behalf, they love us, and they care that we are hurting. With that, I am satisfied that they worship the same Lord that I do. When it comes to scripture, I'm a light weight. I only knew to seek out the quoted passage because of an Alan Jackson song (sorry Scotty), but I think he got it right..."Faith, Hope, and Love are some good things he gave us, and the greatest is Love."
Thanks everyone for your prayers! You remain in mine.
P.S. Remember, I warned you in my post title!
4 comments:
Great post again! Love is so important. Without it, nothing we do has eternal value. For me, love is seeking what is in the best interest of the other person- whether they deserve it or not- and even if it costs something to do so. Even if it means sacrifice.
Jesus embodied that definition of love. Love gives what a person needs. Not necessarily what they want.
The main churches I'd have a problem with are the ones that don't teach salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. I do have concerns or convictions about other issues, but I want to love all, even if they differ with me on issues.
Of course, I fall short of my intentions...
Brian,
You are correct that some churches may follow flawed doctrine, perhaps even flawed theology, but my point would be that if their members know and trust Jesus, they are saved.
Paul wrote to correct many issues in the early churches. Even the apostles faltered a bit (their stance on circumcision), would we contend their concerts weren't saved?
I'm tired of the arguing. As Americans it's nice to have that luxury, but our brethren other countries are dying for their professed faith, without prejudice for what denomination they belong to.
Hope this works. 1st post with a blackberry.
That would be converts not concerts
7am thumb. typing error
I agree with you 100%. Although I really like the idea of saved concerts...
It just seems more efficient. Invite 10,000 people to see a band, profess them all saved and then move on to the next city. Pretty soon, the whole nation follows Christ! I'm sure there's a flaw in my logic somewhere in there!
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