As a child, My mother taught me to love three things in order. First, to love God above all things, then to love yourself, then to love others. This was a great way for me to justify doing things for myself over doing things for others, but that is because I was misreading what I was being taught. While God does expect us to love ourselves, he also expects us to hold others above ourselves when it comes to giving. Jesus' greatest command was to "love others as I have loved you", so we are expected to give ourselves up for the good of others. Today in Theology I read about a women who who decided to face her own death rather than abort her own baby. She was willing to give up everything for someone she loved, which is exactly what Jesus did. Only Jesus did not die for one person, he died for all of us and he would do it again. Now remember what Jesus said, we have to love like he loved, and he loved enough to die for it. SO HOW SCARY IS THAT? Are we all expected to give our lives for each other? Well, sometimes I think the answer is yes, but I don't think we are all exactly called too it.
I am lying down here with my brother realizing all of this. realizing that I may be called to give my life for another person, but at the same time, I already am. Granted all I am doing right now is lying down next to him to scare the "monsters" away, I am sacrificing myself. I'm giving up my own interests for his, and its not so bad. I'm actually kinda happy here. This is what God is calling me to do right now. So no, we don't all have to go get ourselves killed for each other in order to love like Jesus did. Some of us might, but the reality is many of us will fulfill our sacrifices through the little things, through those little wonders we do every day if we just choose to do so.
Its not all that hard to love like Christ did.
No comments:
Post a Comment