God’s plan was to create people in His image with the capacity to love Him and others exactly as He loves. We are to demonstrate that love with all of our being. Dr. Caroline Leaf, brain research scientist, says, “Even the most devout atheist brain scientist agrees human beings are designed to operate and function from unconditional, giving love.”
God’s love transformed the world when He gave Jesus as the sacrifice for our sins. Now He wants to transform the world through us, His sons and daughters, conformed to the exact image of Jesus Christ. (Romans 8:29) We must rise up to the High Calling of Jesus Christ. We must believe what God says about us. We must believe we can do what Jesus did. He loved. He loved by healing. He loved by giving—his time, his compassion, his service and his life.
Why did Jesus do all this? Because He saw us in our finished fullness, a beautiful being with God’s heart and capacity to love fully. “Just as he chose us beforehand in him from before the foundation of the universe, that we shall be holy and without spot before him, and he ordained us beforehand in love for himself.” Ephesians 1:4 We are His joy, His purpose, His bride—the object of His love.
God’s plan has not changed. Therefore we must change our way of thinking and living to align ourselves to fulfill our part in God’s plan. We must learn to see people as God sees them—at the end of their life, trophy in hand, completely in their fullness, exuding the image and likeness of God.
My trouble is I see them as they are. Now. Why? Because that’s all I’ve seen modeled. But God is RENEWING me, calling me into my fullness and asking to see people as He sees them…..finished and perfect, holy and beautiful. He has placed over
7 billion pieces of His heart on this earth. He asks me to love them through demonstration. Why? Because that is how I demonstrate my love to Him. (“The king will answer them, ‘I can guarantee this truth: Whatever you did for one of my brothers or sisters, no matter how unimportant [they seemed], you did for me.’ Matthew 25:40) It’s how I become more and more like Him, as I practice loving those around me. God wants me and you to call forth His purpose in the lives of those we know and meet. He desires for us to “….consider how to spur one another on to love and good deeds.” Hebrews 10:24 God desires for us to love with the love of heaven those who, in our eyes are unworthy, as worthy, as redeemed.
God is building a people. He gave Jesus to live as an example and to die to pay the price for everyone’s sins. Then He raised Him from the dead. Jesus passed His mission and authority to everyone who would believe in Him. Jesus is now there at the right hand of the Father interceding for us, praying for us as we learn to live like Him.
God wants to teach you how to love others as He loves you. The relationships believers share within the church should draw the lost to Christ. The unity of believers is a magnet pulling people to Jesus. John 13:35 says, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
CREATED for COMMUNITY … The huge redwood trees in California are amazing. They are the largest living things on earth and the tallest trees in the world. Some of them are 300 feet high and more than 2,500 years old.
You would think trees that large would have a tremendous root system, reaching down hundreds of feet into the earth. But that is not the case. Redwoods have a very shallow root system.
However, the roots of these trees are intertwined and interlocked. Thus, when the storms come and the winds blow the redwoods still stand.
Redwood Tree Roots intertwined.
With an interlocking root system they support and sustain each other. They need one another to survive. So do we!
God planned for us to dwell in unity as His body filled with and operating by love. “See how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to live together in unity.” Psalm 133:1
Through Christ we are bound together in a community of love and unity. Fellowship with Christ translates into fellowship with each other. God’s love and plan can be summed up in this passage of scripture: “
Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other.” (1 John 4:7-11 ). Jesus is already interacting, intertwining with the whole world.
WE are invited to join Him in His work. He longs to reset us with the love culture of heaven. He wants us to invest His love into people, focusing on who God created them to be and calling them into the fullness of their destiny here on earth. What an awesome invitation!!
God trusts us because He knows His plan will succeed. Let’s join Him. Let’s trust Him. Let’s invest in people. Let’s change the world! Just like God planned.
