Today we will continue looking at and unpacking the passage from 2 Peter 1, focusing on what it means to show affection and love for everyone. This passage has gradually built on itself starting with how to become godly through relationship and transitioning into some characteristics of someone who is growing, including moral excellence and knowledge.
5 In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.
I think in our day and age, it is easy to read this and agree that we need to show love for everyone. The trouble is that we live in an age with so much conflict. Someone once said that conflict is two people living in the same county. How true that is! In society today we have made conflict a full-contact sport, and unfortunately the Church has fallen into that trap as well. Loving others, all others, is one of the hardest things we are required to do as Christians, but it is what should distinguish us from the rest of the world. Jesus said this:
34 So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. 35 Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”
Jesus himself gave us a great summary of what it means to show brotherly affection and love from Matthew 22. Rather than turning our lives into a set of rules to follow, he said we should do just two things:
36 “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?”
37 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’[e] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[f] 40 The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
We are to love God and love people. According to Jesus, these two commandments are EQUAL to each other and, if lived out day to day, meet every single standard in the law. Following Jesus is simple, but it is not easy.
Let's look at this in a day to day perspective. If I'm following this command, I'm kind to others at all times. I'm kind even with those who think different politically than me. I'm kind with people who don't view life through the same lens as I do. I'm kind to all of my neighbors, even the ones who constantly blare loud music and do things to annoy me. I'm kind to people from other religions, and I'm kind to those who have no religion at all.
In fact, it goes so much further than just being kind. I should actually work to help these folks that I have named above. After all, showing love is an action rather than a feeling. That means if anyone from the examples above needs something that would help them, I provide it.
As I have written this, the past week Houston had some incredibly cold weather in our area that we ourselves, and especially our homes, are not equipped to handle. Many people lost power and water, and when things finally did come back on they found that their pipes were frozen solid. And still later when things warmed up, many discovered that their pipes had broken and their houses got flooded as a result. It was in those moments as Jesus followers that we should be the first to step up and help another person out. Love is action. And we don't leave when things start to get messy either, or when we get tired. Love doesn't do that because love is action.
We are not the religious leader who walks by the man who has been beaten up and who is suffering at the side of the road. We are the man who stops and bandages him up and gives him a place to stay until he is better. At our own expense.
Showing love extends even into the electronic realm. On social media I'm kind, because I love others. I don't find it necessary to post or say cutting or demeaning or dehumanizing words. I realize that just because my friend sees things a different way than I do doesn't make them an "idiot" or "totally evil," two of the extremely popular labels on social media today.
Showing love means I go to the grocery store or a local restaurant with the intention to show compassion to others and actually speak to them rather than staring at my phone. I treat my neighborhood as the mission field it is, looking for someone to love and interact with.
Amanda shared a great example of this from the past week. She went to the grocery store after the huge winter storm and many people were still frantic. The store shelves were picked clean, the customers were tense, and the grocery store employees were stressed as a result. She noticed a guy who was bagging groceries that day and his attitude was excellent. He was a hard worker and did a good job and was encouraging others around him. So she took a second to make eye contact with him and thank him for his great attitude and work ethic, and to thank him for showing up to work. She said he really lit up with that encouragement. Why? Because he probably doesn't get much of that these days. It might have been the only encouraging word said to him all day long.
As followers of Jesus we should always be looking for ways to engage others in a truly spiritual conversation. This particular one didn't turn out that way, but we have had times when they actually do. And it is through a small gesture like this where you go out on a limb and show yourself to be different that people take notice.
I think often we wait by the church doors and smile and hope that people will come see us smiling and shaking hands and will think we are different. That's all wrong. Many folks won't come to that building, so what are we going to do in daily life? And smiling at people out in public also isn't enough. That doesn't distinguish you as a follower of Jesus. I know many who don't follow him who smile a lot too.
Peter said in 1 Peter 3:15 these words:
15 Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope as a believer, always be ready to explain it.
These days I think we look too hard for moments that we find to be inspiring. We love our TED talks and YouTube clips and motivational speakers. I've always wondered what the motivational speakers I have heard are like the other 6 days of the week. It's easy to "inspire" in the moment. It is harder to inspire with just the way we live our lives all week. That's what Peter, and Jesus, were talking about as they taught about how a true Jesus follower lives.
Peter's words can really come to life for you in just regular, everyday activity. After all, Jesus didn't come to make us inspiring or to make us into nicer people. He came to make us into new people.
In the time between my calling to Everett and our actual move to there, I distinctly remember some interactions with people at my school. I was truly joyful at what the Lord was doing in my life, that he would actually call me to go to another place for the sake of his name, and I woke up excited every single day to see what he would do. In a conversation one morning someone said something to me that I'll never forget. She looked at me and admitted that she doesn't believe the way I do and doesn't follow Jesus, but she wanted whatever I had. That opened the door for me to talk about how she could have that "thing" that I did.
Was that me just being happy and in a good mood? I don't think so. I know what was going on at that time and can tell you that I felt the Holy Spirit's presence everyday, so much so that I think he just shined through me brightly. It has been said about Christians that we are imperfect people with many flaws and cracks, and that the Lord can shine brightly through our cracks. I think this was one of those moments. In this specific case, Peter's words above came absolutely alive. And I didn't do anything to make it happen. The Lord did.
How can it be this way for you as well? First, I think you have to be willing to be vulnerable. Showing love and compassion means you have to take your wall down and reach into the messiness of someone else's life for a moment. Most of us don't like doing that because we can wind up getting hurt. To truly show love, we have to be willing to be vulnerable first. This may mean that the other person isn't receptive to us or perhaps they will get angry with us for bothering to talk to them. That's okay. Just step out.
I recommend starting your day with him by reading a little of the Bible and praying over what it says. Spend time alone, really alone with him to where your phone is put away and nobody can interrupt you. Read, pray, and pause to listen. Pray for opportunities for him to use you during the day. Pray that he has control of your calendar (he already does), and that you would be flexible enough to let him interrupt it. Thank him for all of the blessings you have, because you have many, and they are from his hand. See what he does with your surrendered day.
Next, step out your front door and see what happens. You don't have to go to talking about Jesus right off the bat with someone. In fact, I would not recommend that at all. Just speak with them about anything. Try to be a friend to them and see where the conversation goes. If it goes nowhere, pray for that person silently and thank the Lord that you got to do that today. Just see where it all goes.
The point is that you are that way all the time, all 7 days per week, not just when you get "inspired" by the message on Sunday. Your joy in relationship with the Lord should just overflow out of you onto everyone else.
I encourage you this week to let your love for Jesus just overflow onto the others around you. That is not something you can force, and you shouldn't try to do that! Instead, it's more about letting go in the small moments and seeing who he will have you encounter that you can show love and compassion to. Let your joy in relationship with Jesus just wash over anyone around you, and see where it leads. That's how you and I can stand out.
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