Today's Devotion

Shine your loving light!




"Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. ~1 John 2:9"



I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. We sure did, it started with Nathen and I attending a parenting seminar at our church. Although the message was a great one..."parents should be responsible for their child's spirituality not the church" the delivery was somewhat negative. I wont go into all the details, as it will depress all of you and my intent is to encourage. Anyways, the speaker spoke of others who may think and have different life styles than him in a very negative way. Now much of what he said I agreed with, but I think we should love each other like brothers and sisters like the Bible says. We can disagree with each other's choices while showing God's love to each other.



As I read this verse this morning I could not help but think of Fred Phelps group who claims to be Christians but are better known for spreading messages of hate instead of messages of love. And unfortunately giving Christians a bad reputation of being hateful, judgemental, and intolerant. I'm not saying that we need to all hold hands and sing together or even agree with one another, but what I think we can do is offer each other unconditional love as God has offered us through giving his son's life. We can disagree with one another by using the Bible as our resource and defense, and do this out of love for another not hate.



You may be thinking "Sarah, brothers in this text is all Christians, and we all think a like". I could be wrong and I don't claim to be a Bibical scholar but I think we are all brothers and sisters in Christ even to a nonbeliever because its our responsibility as a believer to spread the good news of Jesus to each other. And I know us Christians all have differing attitudes, thoughts, and beliefs on several issues. And you know what it really doesn't matter at the end of the day as long as we all agree that Jesus died to save all of us, and is the son of God.



So as Christians let us all show our light and not be pursueded to be in the dark by not loving one another. I challenge all of us to give Christians a better reputation and when a nonbeliever hears someone being a Christian they will think of only loving acts and not hateful words.



In God's love,

Sarah