For The Record

Submit birth, marriage and obituary records online.

Personal Ads

Meet new friends today!

Advertising

Put your message in front of 33,000 readers.

PDF documents on this site require the free Adobe Reader:

Get Adobe Reader

2007-12-18 issue:

How to love as Jesus loved

Grace and Truth column

by Kenneth Thompson

Print Article

God calls the church to proclaim and portray the redeeming, transforming power of a personal faith in Jesus Christ for all people. Some people are enjoying good times; they have much and their needs are few. Others are enduring bad times; they have little and their needs are many. Both experiences, the good and the bad, happy and sad, need to be ministered to.



But what can we do? Is there anything that will help us, a humble people called for a missional purpose, become successful in touching people with God’s hope and healing? How can we share a relevant faith that reaches people where they live? What can invite everyone into true heart-peace and reconcile people of different experiences into one community?

The answer is to love as Jesus loved. Regardless of a person’s position or condition, all need to experience Christians loving them with God’s love.

Jesus shared with his disciples what they needed to know to be successful in life and ministry after his departure. John 13-17 records Jesus purposefully and movingly sharing what we need today to be successful in reaching people. He speaks enthusiastically of a ministry within us for life, more than of the ministry “through” or “upon” us for great works. Each of us in the church has gifts and callings, peculiar graces specific to the assignment we receive from the Lord. But as the church, God commands us all to the same standard of holiness, and that holiness is the presence of Christ within. He is the “common unity” we have, and his love is the “sameness” we share.

What about the ills of society? Are we not called as advocates for its healing? Healing and other great works comprised only a third of Jesus’ public ministry. The overwhelming majority of his life and ministry was given more to modeling God’s love than to working miracles.

Good works accompanied him, but love and mercy are his overwhelming characteristics. Are we not called to speak prophetically and take a stand that speaks truth to power? Shall anyone take a stand before others to speak if he isn’t known for bowing his knee before God to listen? Be a prophetic peacemaker, but be a peacemaker with a pure heart.

Some say, “Brother, what world do you live in? Wake up to reality.” But if they understood the way Jesus revealed and modeled God’s love, they would realize nothing is more real, more practical, more transforming. Someone may say: “The shy and the weak talk of love.

These times demand that people get moving and be led by a man with a plan.” He doesn’t realize it takes courage and strength to love as Jesus loved. Even with an action plan, no one can truly liberate another without knowing how to love freely.

God’s love is not shy, weak or simplistic; its height is equal to its depth, and its endurance is matched by its generosity. What is God’s love? Philosophically, it is his redemptive, creative goodwill that transforms independent people and their systems into an interdependent, empathetic community, resulting in a harmonious society. Practically, it is expressed by joyfully choosing, individually and corporately, to take an action that promotes the well-being of another; it is doing what is most beneficial to the recipient at the moment of need; it is helping create a desired quality of life and maturity, a willingness to inconvenience oneself for another’s true benefit.

This is what Jesus revealed about God’s love and that is how he modeled it. Let’s not be content to say what he did but do as he said. For the sake of your neighbor across the street and around the world, be willing to love as Jesus loved.

Kenneth Thompson is pastor of Friendship Community Church, Bronx, N.Y.

Reader Comments

Add Comments