Love: God's Way

 

                                                  Happy Valentines, Friends.

I hope you are celebrating it with those that you love.

Today's content is about love.

Love, God's way.

And according to what His Word says.

Please read on:

What does the Bible say about love?

The Bible has a great deal to say about love. In fact, the Bible says that “love is of God” and “God is love” (1 John 4:7–8); in other words, love is a fundamental characteristic of who God is. Everything God does is impelled and influenced by His love.

The Bible uses several different words for “love” in the Hebrew and Greek, interchanging them depending on context. Some of these words mean “affectionate love”; others indicate “friendship”; and still others, “erotic, sexual love.” There is also a distinct word for the type of love that God displays. In the Greek, this word is agape, and it refers to a benevolent and charitable love that seeks the best for the loved one.

The Bible gives many examples of love: the caring provision of Boaz for Ruth; the deep friendship of David and Jonathan; the poetic, passionate love of Solomon and the Shulamite; the enduring commitment of Hosea to Gomer; the fatherly love of Paul for Timothy and John for the church; and, of course, the sacrificial, saving love of Christ for the elect.

Agape, the benevolent, selfless love that God shows, is mentioned often in the New Testament, including in the “love chapter,” 1 Corinthians 13. There, love’s characteristics are listed: love is patient and kind; love doesn’t envy, boast, or dishonor others; love is not proud or self-seeking; love is not easily angered, doesn’t keep a record of wrongs, and doesn’t delight in evil; rather, love rejoices with the truth; love always protects, trusts, hopes, and perseveres; love never fails (1 Corinthians 13:4–8). Of the greatest of God’s gifts, faith, hope, and love, “the greatest . . . is love” (verse 13).

The Bible says that God was motivated by love to save the world (John 3:16). God’s love is best seen in the sacrifice of Christ on our behalf (1 John 4:9). And God’s love does not require us to be “worthy” to receive it; His love is truly benevolent and gracious: “God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

The Bible says that, since true love is part of God’s nature, God is the source of love. He is the initiator of a loving relationship with us. Any love we have for God is simply a response to His sacrificial love for us: “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 4:10). Our human understanding of love is flawed, weak, and incomplete, but the more we look at Jesus, the better we understand true love.

The Bible says that God’s love for us in Christ has resulted in our being brought into His family: “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1). Just as the father in the parable showed love to his prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32), so our Heavenly Father receives us with joy when we come to Him in faith. He makes us “accepted in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1:6, NKJV).

The Bible says that we are to love others the way that God loves us. We are to love the family of God (1 Peter 2:17). We are to love our enemies—that is, we are to actively seek what is best for them (Matthew 5:44). Husbands are to love their wives as Christ loves the church (Ephesians 5:25). As we show benevolent, selfless love, we reflect God’s love to a lost and dying world. “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

The Bible says that our love for God is related to our obedience of Him: “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3; cf. John 14:15). We serve God out of love for Him. And God’s love for us enables us to obey Him freely, without the burden of guilt or the fear of punishment.

First John 4:18 says that “perfect love drives out fear” (this is again the word agape). The dismissal of the fear of condemnation is one of the main functions of God’s love. The person without Christ is under judgment and has plenty to fear (John 3:18), but once a person is in Christ, the fear of judgment is gone. Part of understanding the love of God is knowing that God’s judgment fell on Jesus at the cross so we can be spared. Jesus described Himself as the Savior: “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (John 3:17). The very next verse reminds us that the only person who must fear judgment is the one who rejects Jesus Christ.

The Bible says that nothing can separate the believer from the love of God in Christ (Romans 8:38–39). God’s love does not wax and wane; it is not a fickle, emotional sensation. God’s love for sinners is why Christ died on the cross. God’s love for those who trust in Christ is why He holds them in His hand and promises never to let them go (John 10:29).

(source: gotquestions.org)

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Sometimes even after years of loving God, I am still amazed that He loves me. 

Why does He?

I don't understand it.

But I know by His Word

that He does.

And He loves you as well.

Because of His love,

we then can love others.

Thanks for coming by today, Friends 

Monday's s post will be on marriage.

Have a blessed and Happy Valentines Day

New Bible Studies Coming

Hello Friends. I am going to change the direction of my content starting tomorrow. (2/14)

I will be looking up and posting some different topics that I hope will be of interest to all of us.

Since tomorrow is Valentines Day, we will begin with and find out what the Bible says about Love and Marriage.

I hope you will join me. Thanks for stopping by. I pray that you are blessed today as this day continues. 

Prayer Closet Explained

 What is a prayer closet?

After a short discourse on the follies of trying to appear religious in front of people, Jesus talks about prayer. “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matthew 6:5-8). The Greek used here for “room” is tameion, which means "an inner storage chamber or a secret room." The point being, a public prayer, announced on a street corner, gives the pray-er all the attention he can expect to receive. A quiet prayer, directed at God and not passers-by, will reap spiritual blessings.

Some have taken the admonition literally. They set aside a room or a quiet corner in their homes, furnish it with a comfortable chair, table, Bible, and maybe a notebook, and use that corner for a regular prayer time. That’s certainly appropriate, but the fact that the room Jesus referred to most likely meant a pantry gives us a little more flexibility. A “prayer closet” might be a daily commute, a bench in the back yard, or the kitchen table. John Wesley’s mother is said to have sat in a chair and thrown her apron over her head as a sign to her kids to leave her alone. Jesus usually went to a secluded hillside. The point is that the “closet” is free from interruption, distraction, and listening ears.

Although there are good reasons to have a dedicated space for regular prayer—such as training the family to respect the quiet and keeping prayer-related materials in one place—that was not what Jesus was referring to. The passage in Matthew 6 talks about performing religious acts for the purpose of allowing others to see. Any act, be it praying, giving, or serving, should not be done for the purpose of gaining approval from others. Praying, giving, and serving should be responses to our relationship with God and the mercies He has given us. If a specific, dedicated location encourages prayer, it should by all means be used. If the cab of a pickup or a quiet stretch of beach suffices, that’s perfectly acceptable.

(source: gotquestions.org)

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Hello, Friends

I am not adding a picture of a "prayer closet' to todays post.

The reason for this is, I believe a prayer closet can be any room that is quiet and gives us the ability to pray to let our requests be made to God. 

Or maybe that quiet place can be outside. I pray sometimes out on my patio in the morning as I feed the birds that come to my yard.

However, If you go to pinterest, you can find ideas there that would help you design your own prayer room.

I don't think the place matters as much as just getting alone with God and expressing what is on our heart to Him.

He is always ready to listen to us,

and I believe our prayers to Him are more important than where we are when we talk to Him.

But that is just me. 

Thanks for coming by, 

have a great afternoon and be blessed!

Should We Pray the Rosary?

 

Praying the Rosary has never been an issue with me because this is what Catholics do. And I am not a Catholic. Maybe some of you were Catholic and still pray the rosary. I have a relative that did for years after she got born again. However, are there any scriptures that those that left their Catholic religion can still pray with the rosary? 

Its an interesting question that perhaps you may want to know. So, I go again to gotquestions.org for their answer. Please read on:

Is praying the rosary scriptural?

Praying the rosary is promoted within the Catholic Church as a means of strengthening one’s faith, resisting evil, growing spiritually, and generally benefiting society. While some of the prayer of the rosary is scriptural, the whole second half of the “Hail Mary” and portions of the “Hail, Holy Queen” are blatantly unbiblical. While the first part of the Hail Mary is almost a direct quotation from Luke 1:28, there is no scriptural basis for (1) praying to Mary, (2) addressing her as “holy,” or (3) calling her “our life” and “our hope.”

Praying the rosary involves giving attributes to Mary that the Bible never gives her. To call Mary “holy”—the Catholic Church teaches that Mary never sinned or had any taint of original sin—is not biblical. The Bible calls all believers “saints,” which can be interpreted as “holy ones,” but Scripture says that the righteousness believers have is the imputed righteousness from Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21). In this life, no one is yet sanctified from sin in practice (1 John 1:9—2:1). Jesus is called our Savior repeatedly in Scripture because He saved us from our sin. In Luke 1:47, Mary calls God her “Savior.” Savior from what? A sinless person does not need a Savior. Sinners need a Savior. Mary acknowledged that God was her Savior. Therefore, Mary acknowledged that she was a sinner.

Jesus came to save us from our sins (Matthew 1:21). The Roman Catholic Church claims that Mary was saved from sin differently from everyone else—that she was saved from sin through the immaculate conception (her being conceived free of sin). But is this teaching scriptural? The Roman Catholic Church openly admits that this doctrine is not found in Scripture. When a young man addressed Jesus as “good Master” (Matthew 19:16–17), Jesus asked why he called Him “good” since there is none good but one, God. Jesus was trying to make the young man aware that he was using the term good too loosely. In praying the rosary, Catholics use the term holy too loosely. No one, including Mary, is holy but God. This ties in with Romans 3:10–23, Romans 5:12, and countless other passages that stress the fact that in God’s eyes no one measures up. Never is Mary excluded from such all-encompassing statements.

But praying the rosary has an even more basic problem, namely, that much of the prayer is directed to Mary, not to God. We are never told in the Bible whether anyone else in heaven can even hear us. God alone is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-present. When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He taught them to address their prayers to God the Father. Every example of prayer in the Bible is addressed to God alone. There is never a single example of someone praying to any “saint” or angel or anyone else (besides prayers to false gods). Further, any time that a pious person prostrates himself (in a religious setting) to honor someone else besides God (chiefly to the apostles or angels), he is told to get up, to stop it (Acts 10:25–26; 14:13–16; Matthew 4:10; Revelation 19:10; 22:8–9). The Roman Catholic Church states that it worships God alone but “venerates” Mary and the saints. What is the difference? A person praying the rosary spends more time calling out to Mary than to God. For every one praise of God in the rosary, there are ten praises of Mary!

Praying the rosary also assigns a task to Mary that the Bible never assigns her. Jesus is our Redeemer (Galatians 3:13; 4:4–5; Titus 2:14; 1 Peter 1:18–19; Revelation 5:9), our heavenly Advocate (1 John 2:1), and our one and only Mediator (1 Timothy 2:5). The “Hail, Holy Queen” portion of the rosary prayer calls Mary our “most gracious advocate.” This is a direct contradiction of the clear biblical teaching that only Jesus is our go-between.

Praying the rosary requires Catholics to call upon Mary as the “holy Queen.” The only time in Scripture that the title “Queen of Heaven” is found, the term is used in a negative way (Jeremiah 7:17–19; 44:16–27). The Bible never pictures Mary as a queen; rather, she calls herself “the Lord’s servant” (Luke 1:38). She is never given a crown or authority over heaven and earth. Likewise, is it appropriate, while praying the rosary, to call Mary our “life” and “hope”? Again, these are terms that are used of God alone in Scripture (John 1:1–14; Colossians 3:4; 1 Timothy 1:1; Ephesians 2:12; Titus 2:13).

The practice of saying the rosary runs contrary to Scripture in a number of ways. Only God can hear our prayers. Only God can answer our prayers. We have one intermediary (Jesus), and it is in His name we pray, not Mary’s.

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So, there you are, Friends.

Mary has no authority to answer our prayers. She is not to be worshipped. God did give her the awesome privilege to be the mother of Jesus. But He was not only her Son, He was her Lord. Just as He is our Lord. 

Thanks for coming by today. I have been having problems with my pc so I had to transfer everything over to a new one.

Thank you for your patience.

Have a wonderful and blessed evening or whatever time it is

where you are.

Is Prayer Wasted on Some People?

 

Do you ever feel like giving up praying for those you love or care about just because they do not seem to change even though you've prayed for them for years? 

Really, does prayer for some people just hit the ceiling and do not reach the throne of God?

And what does the Bible say about praying for loved ones? Or does it say anything?

Gotquestions.org may answer some of those questions for you, and I am sharing them with you on today's post. Please read ahead:

Is there any scriptural basis for praying on behalf of the unsaved?

Christians are people of prayer (1 Thessalonians 5:17), and some of our prayer requests are in regards to the spiritual condition of our unsaved friends and relatives. We want them to be saved, and we pray to that end. In this we agree with Charles Spurgeon, who said, “If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to Hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. If Hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go unwarned and unprayed for.”

We should be praying for the unsaved. Our Savior came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10), and a principal theme of Luke’s gospel is Christ’s compassion for those often regarded as outcasts in Israel. Our Savior “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4), so when we pray for the salvation of an unsaved person, we are simply sharing in the stated desire of Jesus.

We should pray for the unsaved because, the truth is, it’s not possible for us mere mortals to know who God’s elect are before they become saved (think of Saul of Tarsus). Spurgeon once quipped that it would be nice if the elect had a big E stamped on their back, but, of course, they do not. We do know that all of God’s elect will indeed be saved at some time during their earthly sojourn (see John 6:37, 39), but that may not happen until the day they’re called home to be with the Lord (e.g., the thief on the cross). It is through people with “beautiful feet” who bring the gospel that God uses as the means of reaching His elect (Isaiah 52:7).

We all have people in our sphere of influence who are unsaved, and we should be praying for them because we care deeply about them and because we know that God cares for them and wants none of them to perish—His desire is for all of them to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). It is natural to pray for those we care about. Consider the compassion the young servant girl showed to her Syrian captor: “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy!” (2 Kings 5:3). Assuming that she prayed for Naaman, her prayer was on behalf of the unsaved. Consider the compassion Paul felt for his lost Jewish brothers: “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people” (Romans 9:2–3). Another devout servant of God’s—Moses—was, like Paul, ready to give his life for the sake of his people (see Exodus 32:32).

Jesus instructed us to pray for the unsaved in this manner: “Ask the Lord of the harvest . . . to send out workers into his harvest field” (Luke 10:2). This prayer concerns the “harvest field” of evangelism in the world. It is a prayer that people will be saved and God will be glorified.

We have another biblical command to pray for the unsaved: “I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people. . . . This is good, and pleases God our Savior” (1 Timothy 2:1, 3). The Ephesian church (where Timothy pastored) had apparently stopped praying for the unsaved, and Paul was encouraging Timothy to make it a priority again. His desire was for the Ephesian Christians to have compassion for the lost. Once again, we have no way of knowing who the elect are until they respond. And as John MacArthur aptly points out, “The scope of God’s evangelistic efforts is broader than election” (Matthew 22:14).

“The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective” (James 5:16), and “the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer” (1 Peter 3:12; cf. Psalm 34:15). God indeed hears the cries of His children. We know what happens to those who die in their sins, and that knowledge alone should prompt us to pray incessantly for our unsaved acquaintances in the hope that they, too, will respond to God’s call and join us in heaven.

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Truly, we should be praying for those that do not know Jesus. For it's their very eternity that is in the balance should they die without Him.

This question reminded me of my early marriage.

It wasn't long into it that it was evident that my husband was becoming an alcoholic. Those first years had been so hard. But sometime in about the 12th year, I got serious and started praying for him. God did not answer it right away. In fact, it was a couple more years or so down the road that my husband ended up in the hospital one day and had been admitted into the alcoholic's unit. That ended his drinking career and he lived for many years never taking another drink.

In the meantime, as he got sober, he also got saved and we started going to church. God had been so gracious to us during those years that followed and I will always be thankful for them and the man that I married. Because there were times beforehand that I had not been so thankful. 

I had not given up though once I started praying, even though it didn't happen when I wanted it to. Still God was faithful and it happened in His time, and not mine.

So, if you are praying for someone and not seeing positive results, don't give up. God knows what you need even before you do. And He hears every word you whisper on behalf of those you love.

Thanks for letting me share with you today.

God is good all the time.

And all the time God is good.

Have a blessed day.