"Mine or Thine" -2

"O bless our God, ye people, and make the voice of His praise to be heard: which holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved.'' (Psalms 66:8-9) Let it be known, God is our resource! Plan and simple; if it were not for His love, how would we know love? Don't get me wrong, there is plenty of love to experience in this life; but there is no love compared to the love of God! That might be half the problem with reaching others with the truth, they need to see the Real Love that we know; but there is only one way that they are going to see it, and that is for us to die to ourselves. We might have conquered some sin here and there, or maybe even suffered on behalf of someone that we love; but if we can't express the love of God, then it is only a half life! In the Lexicon, the word "life" has the meaning expressed by a question, "Is your father yet alive?" This is what I believe Paul was getting at in Colossians 3, by saying, "And when Christ, who is your life"; based upon his statement, "Since you have been raised to new life with Christ", the life that we now live is no longer our own, it belongs to Christ. I know that we know that, but do we consistently live it out in our actions? You know that old saying, "Actions speak louder than words", well it's true! We can't get away with the rule of our parents, "Do what I say, not what I do", because the world needs to see something that is real; they need to see God's love manifested in our lives, otherwise we really don't have much to offer them; at least not anything that makes any sense in a world that is dying and afraid. People need to know how much that God loves them, and part of the story is told in the way that we love; does it show up in us? or is it all just a myth? I remember those bumper stickers from the 80's and 90's, the ones that simply said, "Jesus Lives!" Is your Savior yet alive? And if He is, where is He?
"Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. God showed how much He loved us by sending His Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through Him. This is real love - not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and His love is brought to full expression in us." (1 John 4:7-13) NLT