Impossible Love Made Possible

Galatians 5:22-23

When a lawyer asked Jesus which commandment was the greatest, He said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all you heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind,” and “the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Matt. 22:37, 39). What an overwhelming assignment!

In our own strength, none of us can live up to this obligation, but the Lord has provided a way for Christians to do the impossible. The indwelling Holy Spirit works to produce His fruit in us, and first on the list is love (Gal. 5:22). In fact, the other eight qualities are really just descriptions of its expression.

Whenever we demonstrate kindness, patience, or gentleness, we see the Lord’s love at work through us, especially when the other person has been unkind and doesn’t deserve such pleasant treatment. This fruit is not produced by trying harder to muster good will toward someone who is irritating or hard to get along with. Instead, think of the process more like sap running through a branch on a grape-vine. The branch doesn’t make grapes; the sap does. In the same way, the Spirit flows through us, producing God’s love in us, so that we can pass it on to Him and others.

Agapelove is the reason we are able to care for someone who mistreats us—it’s God’s doing, not ours. Even the adoration we offer the Lord is not something that we can produce in our own heart apart from His assistance. Though the command to love is enormous,God’s grace makes it possible.

 

“WHERE THE  SPIRITUAL BATTLE IS WON “

                            

MATTHEW 26:36-46

If you want to experience victory in the conflicts and tough decisions facing you, consider what Jesus did.  Before He got to the cross, the Lord fought a crucial, pivotal battle in the Garden of Gethsemane  , where He wrestled with what lay ahead.

For our Savior, the weights of sin He would bear was overwhelming.  He was about to experience complete spiritual separation from the Father.  He went out to a peaceful and quiet place of prayer, where He got alone before the Father and cried out to Him.  When Jesus left that garden, He walked out a winner.  He would still drink the cup of suffering and separation, but He knew that in the end, He would triumph over it (Hebrews  12:2).

Jesus’ example reveals that the key  to winning life’s battle is to come before the Father-alone with Him and fully surrender  to His will.  Godly counsel is important, but you cannot depend exclusively on others to tell you what to do.  If you don’t spend time alone with the Lord, wrestling things out until you know what He is saying, you’ll never be sure you’re doing the right thing.

By making it a habit to spend time alone in God’s presence you’ll be able to discern His perfect will as you come to major decisions with significant  or even lifelong consequences.  When you fully surrender to Him, you place the consequences of your choices into His most capable hands.  After all , where could your decisions- and your future -be safer than in the control of our all-knowing, all-loving, all-powerful God?