How He Loved Me Today

Just a place to write about how God has loved me every day. :)


Fire away!   How has God loved you today?

Reblogged from davidbowden
David Bowden Poetry: Tokens of Love (A Parable)

davidbowden:

It was a particularly memorable Sunday morning for the church in Scottsdale. The preacher gave a passionate lesson about some of Jesus’ most potent words. “Whatever you do to the least of these brothers and sisters of mine,” the preacher bellowed, “you have done to me.” The church was forever changed. They began to roll down their windows for beggars, providing them with spare bills and coins. They started serving in soup kitchens, homeless shelters and food pantries. They would take old coats and scarves to the freezing vagabonds on the roadside. The church started caring for the “least of these” like never before. Centuries later, the Judgement Day finally came. The church from Scottsdale was especially eager to see in which group, the sheep or the goats, they were placed (as if they didn’t know). The members cold hear Jesus’ grand pronouncements as they moved up the line. His voice sounded just like the preachers did that fateful Sunday. “I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink.” The assembly couldn’t hold back their grins, for they knew they had done what was required. Finally, the eager congregation stepped up to Jesus’ feet to hear their long awaited sentence. “Away from me,” Jesus began with a soft, but stern voice. The assembly was shocked. Jesus continued, “For I was hungry, but you never stopped to ask why. I was thirsty, but you never led me to a well. I was naked and you left me on the street with one old coat. I was a human and you de-humanized me. I needed help and you pretended to help me. I was trapped in a system of oppression and you cast your lots with the oppressors. I needed affection, but you gave me tokens of love.” The stunned and offended church replied, “But Jesus we fed you, clothed you, and gave you drinks of water. We did what you required!” The calm lamb of God just shook his head, “You missed the point. Food, water, and clothes I have and can give freely to those who need. What I needed you for is much more difficult. For inasmuch as you have loved the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you have loved me.” 

“If I give all I possess to the poor…but do not have love, I gain nothing”                                 - Paul (1 Corinthians 13:3)


“ Whenever preachers want to talk about faith, we always go to the “hall of faith” found in Hebrews chapter 11. It’s where the enigmatic author recounts the all-star cast of faith heroes from the Old Testament, all that they believed and all that God did in response to their belief. It’s a beautiful and moving text. And yet there is one verse that always has a way of pricking my skin, the upraised nail I’m never quite looking for. It does nothing to cheapen or lessen the impact of the sweeping statement on faith–it only gives the message depth and texture. Verse 39 says, “These all died in faith, without having received the promises and having welcomed them from a distance.”
And this, ladies and gentlemen, is where faith throbs and aches every bit as much as it motivates and inspires. God keeps His word. Faith is not empty, as Hebrews tells us it is tough and substantial–you can put your weight down on it. But you don’t always get to see the fulfillment of the promise. And you certainly don’t always see the fulfillment on your own schedule. Jonathan Martin

“ When Jesus is mixed up in the story of our scars, this need not be an unhappy affair. Swallowed up in the story of Christ’s resurrection, every scar is absorbed into the visible wounds on His hands and on His feet. In him, scars aren’t just stories. Scars are testimonies. Jonathan Martin
“ I think generally scars are often more than the sum total of tragic memories. Scars speak of identity, scars speak of calling. Scars speak of the truth of a man beneath the deception of his clothes. No wonder when Paul writes to early Christian communities, he is always speaking of the scars he has accumulated from persecution for the sake of Jesus’ name. The message embedded in our scars, the code encrypted implicitly beneath ruptured skin, is not just of our pain but of God’s faithfulness. Scars tell the story of who we really and where we really come from, even when we refuse to speak the truth with our eyes or our lips. Like the rings on the interior of a tree, everything you could ever want to know about a person can be read from their scars. Jonathan Martin

“

If I did have to have apologetics to offer, it would always come back to beauty. Who needs a system in a world with this much beauty? There is so much of it. It doesn’t seem like a stretch to believe God raised Jesus from the dead in light of the extraordinary elegance I see around me. There are more complex and more nuanced ways of saying that, but at the end of the day that is always what it comes down to for me.

I do not diminish the challenges posed to us by the evil, injustice and suffering in the world. But I still can’t get over the constellations.

 Jonathan Martin, “Constellations”

Reblogged from levithepoet
“ … and while his death was ugly we must not let it scare us from God. Abundant grace has restored him. A brand new body. And set him free from the torture, finally rid of the cancer. Before the moment he left he briefly wrested from death, suddenly opened his eyes, said, ‘I SEE EVERYTHING. I SEE EVERYTHING.’ La Dispute (via levithepoet)

“What the world is missing is what you have always longed to do…START SOMETHING THAT MATTERS.”

-David Bowden

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Reblogged from greater--things

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Reblogged from amdrennan

Reblogged from spiritualinspiration

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