UPDATE! The winner of the Life to the Full pitcher is…
Gena, of My Daily Portion! WOOT!!!!!!!!!
Love taught me how to live life to the full.
Love brought me under His wing and freed me in two ways. The first freedom came with that wild grace-love that took my sin to the tree and gave me perfection in its place. Nothing compares with being made beautiful for eternity.
The second way love freed me is what brings my words to you today.
Love, His tender guiding patient love showed me the Law. Do you know the Law? It goes like this:
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Matthew 22:37-40
All of the Law summed up in one word: Love.
You see, I received the love of my God when I believed that He hung to save my soul, but I did not yet know what it meant to love others, to really love others.
To love…
when it’s hard,
and risky.
And there is sin and mess and a logged eye (my own).
I could easily love the person with the veil over their eyes, not seeing or knowing or comprehending the savior. I could love the broken. But I could not love my siblings in Christ if I thought they were ungrateful, disobedient, and/or flippant of my Jesus. I had a very hard heart. I was angry and self-righteous.
Enter the grace of my God as He began to reveal to me my hardness and my anger (and my complete inadequacy to live as I expected others to). Tenderly, He reminded me that it is by grace I am saved, nothing I have done, and nothing anybody else can do; it is a gift ((Ephesians 2:8,9). He showed me that I am perfected for all eternity (Hebrews 10:14), and so are my brothers and sisters in Christ – now we all just walk it out one faith step at a time. Those who know Him have the Spirit who gives revelation in agreement to the Word. My “job?” Love.
Love as if my life depended on it (1 Peter 4:8).
Love others –it is the second part of the whole of the Law.
Loving God, and loving others has brought me life to the full.
Loving others without condition has been the most glorious, freeing, fulfillment of His love for me. Friends, it feels so good to be free.
Fill me up Jesus, let me bathe in your love, and give me the grace to love others without condition.
…
Tell me friend, what does it mean to you to live life to the full? Would you link up a post sharing your story, your life, your learnings? It can be old or brand new.
One of the ways we’d like to fill you up today is by giving away the Life Collection – Large Pitcher shown at the top to one of you who links up by 3/16.
{And all this month we’ll be offering 30% of any Life to the Full item. Just use code LIFE30}
By Sarah Mae, Like a Warm Cup of Coffee
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