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Do You Love the Word?
By guest blogger: Matthew Ketterling who currently serves at youth pastor at Church of the Open Door in Glendora, Ca.
A number of years ago when I was a kid, a man asked me a question that took me off guard. In what appeared to me to be a completely disjointed turn in the conversation, this man looked me in the eye and asked,
“Do you love the Word?”
“I’m sorry? What…”
“Do you love the Word of God? The Bible?”
I lied. “Sure. Doesn’t everybody?”
In my defense, he put me in an impossible situation. What was a church kid supposed to say? At least I didn’t blankly answer, “Jesus.”
I can honestly say today that I do love the Word. More than that, I see one of my primary tasks as a pastor and our collective task as the church of Jesus is to grow in a genuine love for the Word of God and to pass this love on to our children. Day in and day out we look to the Bible not merely for “good moral principles” but in order to interact directly with the Word of truth that can pierce into the deepest parts of who we are. In a world where ideas and pop culture shift and flow all around us, the church finds its anchor in the revealed truth of the Bible which colors all the major questions about who we are, why we are here, and what our relationship to God is like. And, as we do this for ourselves, we teach our kids and students to do the same.
In my experience in ministry, there are two common obstacles to loving the Scriptures:
First, we often hear the complaint from our students that they can’t understand the Bible. And I can certainly relate! There are many things in Scripture that puzzle me. And yet, as much as this is true, there are many more things that just make perfect sense! I do not need a complete understanding in order for the Word of God to impact my life. If you are seeking help, find a church that preaches the Word and models study methods. Or better yet, find a church that will put you in a small group of 5-10 people that will read and study the Bible together. We can grow into believers with the confidence to “rightly divide the word of Truth”.
The second attitude that is so detrimental to loving the Word is actually the exact opposite from the first: we think we have got the Bible figured out. I remember as a kid reading the entire Bible (which really meant that my eye at least passed over every word!). How naïve I was when I thought, “Well, I have conquered the Bible!” Do we expect to completely understand the most influential and studied book in history on a first reading? The truth is that gaining an understanding of Scripture will take a lifetime! So a necessary part of loving the Word is to humble ourselves before it.
A love of Scripture comes from confident humility! God bless Whitestone Media towards this goal as they give our children tools to understand our God’s Word and a sense of wonder at its depths!
2 Timothy 2:15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
God's Perfect Love and Our Obedience
By guest blogger: Michael Anderson
When I was a boy I yearned for a dog. I begged and begged my father for one. Then one night a family friend came over with a dog for sale. This dog was absolutely pitiful. He was mostly blind; all he could see was his own shadow, which he barked at incessantly. He excreted an oil that smelled horrible and quite literally stung your skin if you touched him. This poor dog, was a dog that not even a mother could love. But in this pitiful dog I saw my only chance at happiness. For days I nagged my father for this dog. He repeatedly responded, “Son just trust me and let it go.” But eventually I wore him down until he agreed to let me have the dog. And it was an absolute disaster. No one wanted to touch him, he was horribly misbehaved, and cost my parents hundreds of dollars, in vet bills on a regular basis. Later I found out that my parents had already picked out a puppy for me from an award winning show dog and were merely waiting for the puppy to be old enough to bring home. Now as harsh as it may seem to my dog, I wish I had trusted my father. I had no doubt of his love for me. The sacrifices and provisions that he had given me should have been enough for me to trust him and obey when he asked me to “let it go”.
That was an important lesson I learned about my father. But it is even more important for me to learn about that lesson about my heavenly Father. You see, I love my father, but he is merely a man and a sinful man at that. But the Lord is perfect and His love is perfect. How much more can we trust Him and His love for us when He asks us to obey Him (John 15:14)?
Obedience is a negative word in our culture today. We fear that in obeying we lose control to someone who may not have our best interests in mind or we fear that if we obey another we will “lose ourselves”, that is, we will lose our identity.
But this is the amazing thing about our Lord’s call to obedience. As believers in Christ, as those who have been redeemed by Christ’s blood, there can be no doubt about the Lord’s love for us (Romans 8:32). It is because of His perfect love for us that we can trust Him when He asks us to obey.
Further, we were created to walk with God. When we obey Him we are walking with Him. There is never a time in which we are more ourselves and our hearts are more at home, then when we are obeying the will of God (Romans 8:21). It is through obedience to Him that God sanctifies us, that is He makes us holy and more like our true selves.
What’s more, not only does Jesus ask us to obey Him, but He models that obedience. Paul tells us in Philippians, that we should be like Christ Jesus who took on human flesh and humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:8). He did all this because He loved the father and He trusted the Father’s love for Him. We see that trust and mutual love so powerfully when Jesus asks the Father to take the cup of suffering and death from Him and still says “but your will be done” (Luke 22:42).
Thankfully the story doesn’t end at Christ’s obedient death. Paul goes on in Philippians 2 to say that as a result of Christ’s obedience God exalted Him and gave Him the name that is above every name so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow...and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Philippians 2:9-11). Jesus trusted the Father’s great love for Him and was obedient. Likewise it is in our trust of the Lord’s great love for us, that we can learn to obey Him. And it is through our obedience that we demonstrate our love toward Him.
Verse of the Day: Romans 12:1-2
"I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." - Romans 12:1-2
Quote of the Day: Joni Eareckson Tada
"Real satisfaction comes not in understanding God's motives, but in understanding His character, in trusting in His promises, and in leaning on Him and resting in Him, as the Sovereign who knows what He is doing and does all things well." - Joni Eareckson Tada
Verse of the Day: Psalm 19:14
"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart Be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer". - Psalm 19:14
Worldy Love vs. Biblical Love
By guest blogger: Michael Anderson
Growing up, I collected trinkets. One of my favorites was a miniature Eiffel Tower key chain. I can’t say why but for some reason that key chain was very important to me. I had a habit of frequently checking on it just to be sure it was where I had left it. Years later, I thought of that key chain with amusement as I stood before the real Eiffel Tower in all it’s glory, it left me breathless in a way my key chain never could. In relation to the real thing, my small little trinket was just that, a small little trinket, it was utterly inadequate.
The world makes much of love. However with all that focus the world’s concept of love is utterly inadequate when compared with biblical love. There are two aspects of love I wish to point out. This week I will highlight the world’s definition of love. Next week I will highlight another aspect. The world defines love as a feeling of fondness. This feeling of fondness is an involuntary action. We often hear that so and so is falling in or out of love. We hear “you can’t choose who you love”. We get the sense that whether one loves another is completely out of their control. In contrast, the biblical view says that when we love someone, we desire their good.
In Matthew 19:19 I am told to love my neighbor as myself. So how do I love myself? Well I certainly don’t always have feelings of fondness toward myself. In fact, there are aspects of myself that I am not fond of at all. But does this mean I do not love myself? Absolutely not. It is precisely because I love myself that I don’t feel fond of my sinful aspects. If it turns out I am a wicked person, then loving myself means that I should dislike my wickedness and take steps to change it, because, in loving myself, I desire what is best for myself. And if I am to love my neighbor as myself, then I am desiring their good as well. I am called to love them even if I don’t have fond feelings toward them.
In one of the greatest passages on love, Paul begins his positive description by saying “Love is patient” (1 Cor 13:4). That is, love is long suffering. When our brother lets us down, when our husband is spiteful, when our friend acts cruelly toward us it becomes very difficult (some may say impossible) to have fond feelings toward them. Yet Paul says we are to be long suffering in our love. Even when my neighbor harms me, I am to desire his good, even when my spouse lashes out at me I am to desire her good, even when my children disappoint me, I am to desire their good. If the world is right about love, the moment long suffering is required, love goes out the window. But thanks be to God that through the Holy Spirit by Christ’s example we can have a much deeper love, a love that endures. The kind of love by which and for which men do heroic deeds.
