THE APOSTLE OF LOVE

The Gospel-writer John has often been nicknamed “the apostle of love.” Indeed, he wrote more than any other New Testament author about the importance of love – laying particular stress on the Christian’s love for Christ, Christ’s love for His church, and the love for one another that is supposed to be the hallmark of true believers. The theme of love flows through his writings.

But love was a quality that he learned from Christ, not something that came naturally to him. In his younger years, he was as much a Son of Thunder as James. If you imagine that John was the way he was often portrayed in medieval art -- a meek, mild, pale-skinned, effeminate person, lying around at Jesus’ shoulder looking up at Him with a dove-eyed stare -- forget that caricature. He was rugged and hard-edged, just like the rest of the fishermen-disciples. And again, he was every bit as intolerant, ambitious, zealous, and explosive as his elder brother. In fact, the one and only time the synoptic Gospel writers recorded John speaking for himself, he displayed his trademark aggressive, self-assertive, impertinent intolerance. (See Mark 9:38.)…

So it is clear from the Gospel accounts that John was capable of behaving in the most sectarian, narrow-minded, unbending, reckless, and impetuous fashion. He was brash. He was aggressive. He was passionate, zealous, personally ambitious – just like his brother James. They were cut from the same cloth.

But John aged well. Under the control of the Holy Spirit, all his liabilities were exchanged for assets. Compare the young disciple with the aged patriarch, and you’ll see that as he matured, his areas of weakness all developed into his greatest strengths. He’s an amazing example of what should happen to us as we grow in Christ -- allowing the Lord’s strengths to be made perfect in our weakness. (See 2 Corinthians 12:9.) 

-- John MacArthur (1939-2025) in “Twelve Ordinary Men: How the Master Shaped His Disciples for Greatness and What He Wants to Do with You”

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OFFERING AS AN ACT OF WORSHIP

“When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, Jesus went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind Him at His feet weeping, she began to wet His feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.”  (Luke 7:36-38 NIV)

In Luke’s Gospel, we read the story of a woman who brought to Jesus a jar of expensive perfume which she broke open and poured out on Him… as an offering. She did not have to give it, but she made a choice. She did not give from obligation, but an open heart. She did not come for an hour, put her offering in a basket, and immediately leave to go back to her daily activities. She stopped. She wasn’t too busy or distracted by the world to surrender her thanksgiving and linger with her Savior as an act of worship. This outpouring of her time cost her, but it would be repaid by an outpouring of mercy and peace from Jesus.

There are many contrasts in the passage. The Pharisees were religious and educated. The woman was sinful and wasn’t allowed to study. The Pharisees were there to question Jesus. The woman was there to worship Jesus. The Pharisees were prideful. The woman was humble. The Pharisees shunned the sinful woman. Jesus showed her mercy. Because the woman was willing to come before Jesus with her broken offering, she received wholeness and redemption. What a moment. 

-- Excerpted from “Altar’d: The Transforming Power of Surrender” by Susan O. Kent

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DISCIPLESHIP… COMPASSIONATE CARING

"As God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience."  (Colossians 3:12 NIV)

South African pastor Trevor Hudson identifies compassionate caring as the distinguishing mark of faithful discipleship: “Compassionate caring creatively balances the inward-outward dynamic so characteristic of Jesus’ life, saves us from falling prey to the latest fad in the spiritual supermarket, and catapults our lives into a deeper engagement with the brokenness of our world.” 

In a world saturated with spiritual trends and political slogans, Trevor Hudson’s words cut through the noise with clarity: true discipleship is marked not by novelty, but by compassion. Jesus didn’t chase popularity or perform for applause. He moved toward the broken, the weary, the overlooked -- with a heart full of mercy and a life poured out in love.

Compassionate caring is not sentimentalism. It’s a radical posture of the heart that refuses to separate spiritual formation from social engagement. It’s the kind of love that listens deeply, acts boldly, and suffers willingly. It’s the inward transformation that spills outward into a world aching for grace.

When we embrace this rhythm -- being formed by Christ and sent in His name -- we resist the temptation to treat faith as a consumer product or a political tool. Instead, we become conduits of healing, agents of hope, and reflections of the One who came not to be served, but to serve. 

-- SOUND BITES Ministry™, compiled from a variety of sources

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DISCIPLESHIP… EXPRESSING THE LOVE OF CHRIST

Looking at His disciples, Jesus said, “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that. And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”  (Luke 6:32–36 NIV)

The stretch of Christian discipleship is to love those for whom it is not automatic, easy, common, or accepted. To love those who do not think like us or live like us, and to express respect, compassion, and mercy to those we do not know and who may never be able to repay us -- this is the love Christ pulls out of us. Jesus stepped across oppressive social boundaries, intermingled with those who suffered crippling infirmities and social stigma, and offered hope to those at their point of gravest despair. He loved the least lovable and the most vulnerable, and He offered the same unmerited grace to the greatest sinner as to the finest saint. The down-and-out see in Christ as much love for them as the up-and-coming. And Christ invites His disciples to follow Him into this kind of love. 

-- Robert Schnase in “Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations”

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FROM DESPERATION TO WHOLENESS

Mark 5:25-34 tells the story of a woman who had suffered for twelve years with a condition that left her physically drained and socially isolated. Her story reminds us of the transformative power of faith in Christ.

The woman, having exhausted all earthly options, approached Jesus in desperation. Her faith drove her to reach out and touch His garment, believing that even the smallest act could connect her to His power. Often, it is in our lowest moments of desperation -- when we recognize our own limitations -- that we truly open the door to God’s miraculous intervention.

For years, her condition had left her ostracized, an outcast in her community. But Jesus didn’t just heal her physically; He publicly acknowledged her, calling her "Daughter." In that moment, she was restored not only to health but to belonging. God’s power doesn’t just address our needs -- it draws us into relationship with Him and with others.

The touch of Jesus didn’t merely stop her bleeding; it made her whole. God’s power goes beyond the surface, bringing complete restoration to body, mind, and soul. When we turn to Him, we experience not just healing but transformation into the fullness of life He intends for us.

Let this passage remind us that no matter how desperate or isolated we feel, God’s power in Christ is available to bring us into healing, community, and wholeness. May we, like the woman, reach out in faith to Christ and experience His transformative love. 

-- Based on a sermon by Pastor Wes Olds, Grace Church, Cape Coral, Florida  

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DO WE LOVE JESUS? – Part 2

One day, as part of a series of messages designed to set a new direction and to connect with the heart of what is basic and essential about our lives as spiritual beings, my wife, Rebekah, preached a series titled “Do You Love Jesus?”

Evidently she caused quite a stir. Early the next day a gentleman wielding a lot of political clout strode into her office and demanded, “What do you mean by asking us if we love Jesus?”

“It’s a good question,” she responded. “So let me make it a little more personal: Tell me, ‘George,’ do you love Jesus?”

The man was beside himself. The very idea, the affront of the question. How dare anyone ask about such a personal and potentially emotional topic? Why, that was between him and Jesus.

The point, of course, is that our love for Jesus needs to be immediate, intense, and quite overwhelming. A deeply personal love, yes, but also a love that is profoundly visible. If we do not allow ourselves to fall in love with the Savior to the extent that our emotions, our thoughts, and ultimately our behaviors are all touched and enlarged by that love – then our spiritual journey will not take us much farther than tentative participation at best...

Love for Jesus changes us from the inside out. 

-- Derek Maul in “Get Real: A Spiritual Journey for Men”

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DO WE LOVE JESUS? – Part 1

“Jesus said to him, ‘Simon son of John, do you love Me?’”  (John 21:17a NIV)

One reason spiritual life is so vibrant at my church is because we have so many men who aren’t afraid to show their deep love for Jesus. “The Holy Spirit is loose in this church,” my good friend Jerry said one Sunday. That’s what happens when both women and men have the courage to let go of their cultural inhibitions and allow themselves to be touched personally by a living Savior.

Things haven’t always been that way. Indeed, a decade ago the number of faithful and active men involved was disappointingly low and mostly limited to those over fifty.  As a community of faith our corporate spiritual growth was significantly stunted.  You could walk into the sanctuary on Sunday morning, and all you could feel was the presence of hungry people waiting for something that wasn’t happening. Good people, yes, but there was little sense of vitality, no powerful rush of spiritual energy, and scant evidence of the abundant joy to be found when we claim and embrace our love for Jesus. 

-- Derek Maul in “Get Real: A Spiritual Journey for Men”

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EXPANDING FAITH THREE SIZES

“Afterward Jesus appeared again to His disciples, by the Sea of Galilee. It happened this way: Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. ‘I’m going out to fish,’ Simon Peter told them, and they said, ‘We’ll go with you.’ So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.”  (John 21:1-4 NIV)

Thinking all is lost after the crucifixion, some of the disciples go fishing on the Sea of Galilee -- a dismal, depressing, fishing expedition. Hot, naked, and exhausted, the disciples try valiantly to return to the way things were before they met Jesus. Suddenly a voice from the shore (big rock thrown here): “Catchin’ anything?” “Nah,” they shout back, more depressed than ever. “Then try the other side of the boat!” the voice yells again. Peter stands up to see who this wise guy is. Wait -- no, it can’t be -- but, yes, it is: the Lord! Suddenly Peter can’t move fast enough. He leaps into the water, and swims to shore, leaving the others to haul in a miraculous catch. His faith grows three sizes in a matter of minutes. The boundaries of what he thinks God can do explode, and his love and gratitude for what God is doing in Jesus Christ, Lord of Life, is simply too large to fit in the boat any more. 

-- Kenda Creasy Dean and Ron Foster in “The Godbearing Life”

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JESUS’ EXPRESSION OF LOVE

When Jesus knelt before Peter and prepared to wash his feet, He met with some serious resistance. Peter protested, saying, “No, You will never wash my feet!” It’s impossible to say why he was so adamant. Surely he felt that such a job was beneath Jesus. Or maybe his feet were unusually ugly, dirty, or diseased. Or it might have had something to do with Peter’s pride. Whatever the case, he wanted nothing to do with Jesus’ expression of love and tenderness.

If I’d been in Jesus’ position, I would have thrown my hands into the air and said, “OK, OK… no need to get upset. If you don’t want me to wash your feet, I’ll just skip you and move on.”

But Jesus wasn’t put off by Peter’s resistance. He never is.

This is one of the greatest facts about our Lord. We can avoid, defy, elude, rebuff, resist, or reject Him, but it doesn’t change the way He feels about us. Nor does it diminish His desire to bless us. 

-- Mark Atteberry in “Free Refill: Coming Back for More of Jesus”

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FALLING IN LOVE

“We love because He first loved us.” (1 John 4:19)

Applying human criteria for "falling in love," does it describe your love for God? That is, do we get that sense of awe and wonder? Do we relish the time spent together? Do we think about Him as we go about our day? Worshipping our Lord should stir emotions in our very soul. Yes, we should be "in love" with God Almighty. We should nourish that love and strive to build it stronger and stronger as we together face the trials of this earth. Our experiences in life should bring us closer and closer to our God. He is there, willing and waiting.

-- Pastor Gary Stone

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BECAUSE WE LOVE JESUS

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”  (Mark 12:30 NIV)

Sometimes as I think about the accomplishments of others, just for a moment I wonder, “What if…?” But then, almost immediately, I’m reminded that God has given me my own unique purpose in life.

Psalm 23:3 says, “He guides me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” To find and follow those paths, to work out His purpose for our lives, will require reading and studying God’s Word and praying about how it applies to us. It will involve obedience and service. Not because we have to but because we love Jesus. That’s the path He has laid out before us.

With all your heart just follow Jesus. From personal experience, I can assure you, you’ll be blessed. Satisfied. Fulfilled. He will never mislead you. He will lead you right. Follow Him! 

-- Anne Graham Lotz in “Fixing My Eyes on Jesus: Daily Moments in His Word”

#5005

SALTY BELIEVERS

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”  (Matthew 5:13 NIV)

Salt can be used in food as a preservative, but it can also make people thirsty and food tasty. Jesus said those who believe in Him are the salt of the earth; our function is to make others hungry and thirsty for Him.

Are you losing your saltines? Today it’s easy to become saturated in selfishness and materialism, so engrossed by entertainment and politics, so anesthetized by religion and tradition, that we’re in danger of losing the uniqueness of who we are in Christ. As a result our “salt” no longer makes people “thirsty” for Jesus or the things of God “tasty.”

When that happens, we desperately need to recharge our saltiness by renewing our personal knowledge of God, our passionate love for Christ, our practical devotion to the Holy Spirit, our purposeful commitment to the gospel so that once again, we are salty believers.

Be the salty saint that you are!

-- Anne Graham Lotz in “Fixing My Eyes on Jesus”


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OUR LOVE FOR GOD

“Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”  (Psalm 73:25-26 NKJV)

Nothing must become a rival to our love for God, even if it is something good. We sometimes have a tendency to let our service for Christ become a substitute for a longing heart to know Him more fully. To be active in missions work is a good thing. But to be so active in missions that one has little or no time to wait before God in prayer is to miss the point of true discipleship. Our first priority is an unhindered, unrushed experience of God, preferably in quietness and solitude. Then we can go from that experience renewed and energized to do the work of the Lord.

-- Jerry Mercer in “Cry Joy!”


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CHRIST’S LOVE IN YOU

“I pray that… out of His glorious, unlimited resources He will give you the mighty inner strengthening of His Holy Spirit. I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts, living within you as you trust in Him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love; and may you be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high His love really is; and to experience this love for yourselves, though it is so great that you will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it. And so at last you will be filled up with God Himself.”  (Ephesians 3:15-19 TLB)

Only God can give us a selfless love for others, as the Holy Spirit changes us from within. This is one reason we must receive Christ, for apart from His Spirit we can never be freed from the chains of selfishness, jealousy, and indifference. Will others see Christ's love in your life today?

-- Billy Graham in “Hope for Each Day: Words of Wisdom and Faith”


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A SPORADIC PRAYER LIFE?

“Now all glory to God, who is able, through His mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.”  (Ephesians 3:20 NLT)

What would my life be like if I just stopped praying altogether? I mean, what if God promised me that things would stay the same regardless of whether I prayed or not: would I still continue to pray? That’s a hard question. But I’ve thought about it because on a whole other level I’m a little curious about why some of us feel compelled to pray, even when our scales of belief are tipped toward the negative.

But even with a sporadic prayer life, I can’t imagine a life without prayer, without some effort to reach for God with all the cares and worries I drag with me wherever I go, and without some effort to invite God to speak to me in the times when I am sensible enough to just be quiet. Plus there’s a side of me that doesn’t really know how to express my love for God without prayer in my life. I’m not sure when or how I started feeling this way, but somewhere along the line, I’ve discovered that when I do pray, I am reminded of who God is and who I am. It’s hard to pray for anything without at some point naming God as one who is capable of all things.

-- Enuma Okoro in “Reluctant Pilgrim”


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A DEEP LOVE FOR JESUS

“May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.”  (Ephesians 3:19 NLT)

I recently interviewed a pastor while preparing a story for the local newspaper. As always, the visit was positive, and I enjoyed the meeting on many levels. We talked about his family, his career, his relationship to the community,… and the church he built and loved so deeply.

Then I asked the pastor about Jesus. I asked him about what still motivates him to keep on preaching after all this time, and I asked him why the message he delivers on Sunday should have anything at all to do with the day-to-day balance of our lives.

“Let me tell you about Jesus,” he said. And immediately his eyes filled with tears. He shared the simple testimony of how Jesus connected with his humble life and called him into service, and how his Savior remains so profoundly linked to every moment of his every day, and he couldn’t help but let the tears flow.

“I’m so sorry about the tears,” he said. “But I can’t talk about Jesus without being affected this way. I just love Him so much.”

He… used to work as a superintendent for an oil company. He knew how to handle himself. He was all man all the way through. Yet the love of Jesus touched his heart and his soul so deeply that it still brought tears to his eyes.

Such deep love for Jesus is the key to spiritual growth and the way we move ever closer to God. 

-- Derek Maul in “Get Real: A Spiritual Journey for Men”


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