The Greatest of These is Love
It’s an old Mike Bickle quote that I’ve held onto for years:
“Lovers outwork workers.”
And what Mike means is that love motivates the heart. Love motivates better than money. Better than ego. Better than just about anything. People who fall in love, be it with people or causes or anything else, will think about the object they love more, do more, and tell more people about it simply because of their love.
People in love with Jesus don’t have to be motivated to spend time in prayer. People who love their church family don’t have to be begged to come to a meeting. People who love the gospel don’t have to be guilted into sharing it. They do it all out of love.
Maybe it’s time, instead of teaching people how to behave, we invite them into love.
Set me as a seal upon your heart,
as a seal upon your arm,
for love is strong as death,
jealousy is fierce as the grave.
Its flashes are flashes of fire,
the very flame of the Lord.
Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can floods drown it.-Song of Solomon 8:6-7
Photo Credit: Heart by seyed mostafa zamani
Transforming Relationships
The most transforming relationship that you’ll ever be a part of is a relationship with Jesus.
But once in a relationship with Jesus, He leads us into relationships with His followers that have a transforming affect on our lives.
Transforming relationships are transparent, relational, and accountable.
They begin with transparency. You open up about your weakness and failures, your struggles, and your great need for a savior. Frequently this gives permission for others to be honest about their brokenness in a way that few have ever had. This is usually the missing element in transforming relationships.
Built on transparency, true brotherhood or sisterhood emerges. What wrecks relationships is jealousy, competition, and ego. So with the newfound transparency a true relationship is born. You help each other, not to get, but because you see and understand each other. Mutual relationship gives birth to love which gives birth to serving one another.
And finally (but usually the part we want first) is accountability. Once we have been honest about our weakness and have been in a relationship of love and service to one another, we can hold one another accountable. This isn’t the kind of accountability where you say “Try harder or I’m done with you,” but an accountability that’s birthed out of genuine care for a weak and broken human being. And because it’s birthed out of love and mutual understanding, this type of accountability (along with the power of Jesus) births transformation in the human heart.
We all want these types of relationships. The mechanics of these relationships aren’t difficult. The reason we see so few people enter into them is they are costly. Someone has to go first. But once you’ve had one or two, you’ll never go back.
The Crucified Life Makes Room for the Spirit
Yesterday I argued that uncrucified Christianity is a hot mess.
As I was writing yesterday, the Holy Spirit began to speak to me a little bit about the idea that taking up our cross is the way that we make room for the Holy Spirit.
This should be obvious: Most of Galatians 5 talks about how the flesh and the Spirit are at war with one another within us. Paul goes on to say that those who belong to Jesus “nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there,” (Galatians 5:24).
If you go back and read Galatians 5, Paul is almost circular in his reasoning: “Let the Holy Spirit lead you. Then You won’t desire the things of the flesh. But you have to have crucified your fleshly desires. So walk in the Spirit.” As you read it, you see this divine cycle where we both get help from God and we partner with God in this fight against our uncrucified selves.
My point is this: Taking up our cross opens a realm of activity for the Spirit. It’s not an accident that Jesus’ death on the cross opened up Pentecost for the early church. So if we desire greater activity of the Holy Spirit, we have to (by His help) appropriate the crucifixion in our own lives.
Friends, I am about as charismatic as they come. I desire more of the Holy Spirit moving and operating in my life. But there is some of the flesh, some self-glorification, some level of selfishness that has tainted much of the Spirit-empowered work at least in many parts of the world where I have witnessed it.
But I have also seen parts the work of the Spirit where people are laying down their lives for Jesus and the Gospel. In these places, the men and women have a purity like I haven’t seen. They aren’t flashy. The Gospel spreads. Miracles are common and Jesus is glorified. And this is what I’m hungry for in the West. Not just miracles. The fullness of the Holy Spirit that comes when we lay our lives down.
Today, I’m sort of just ranting. But I hope I’m right about this reality and I hope we all together can pursue this and encourage others, so that more and more of the church can be swept up into this reality.
Cluster Map
Pursuing Glory 