Extravagance part 5
God has (and will, and is, and does) lavished His extravagant love on us. He filled us up with it when He filled us up with Himself. When He filled us up with His Spirit. When He gave us a heart transplant--and underwater surgery in the waters of baptism, if I can say it that way--and put His heart of love in our chests. My point is: It's not something that needs to happen. It's something that has already happened. And because it has already happened--this is the key... receiving AND releasing--because God has already loved us... we can love Him back... by loving each other. We can take what we've been given and we can give it away. We can experience it BY giving it away. By sharing it. We can be extravagant in our love one to another because of how extravagant God is in His love for each and every one of us. Look at 1 John 4:10-11, "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another." Or 1 John 3:16, "Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." Don't get it twisted though. What we ought to do doesn't mean what we are obligated to do. I don't think you should do things out of a sense of obligation. I think if you feel obliged to do something--"well, they scratched my back, guess I better scratch theirs"--it's almost a grudging thing. And if you're doing something you really don't want to do, you're probably going to do it half-heartedly. At best. When you should do everything you do heartily--because it's in your heart to do it and to the best of your ability. That's what love is: Giving everything you have and everything you are without worrying about things like whether or not they deserve it. Just giving what you've got because you have it and they need it. Because it's too good to keep to yourself. The New Commandment for the New Man is to love one another as Jesus has loved you. To receive and release His love. So, if God wants you to love big... He must first love you big. And that's exactly what He did on the cross. He gave it all. He gave His life FOR you, and He gave His life TO you. So that you could have it. So that you could experience it as Jesus lives His own life in you, and through you, and as you. But don't do it because you think you're "supposed to." Don't do it because you think you'll get something out of it if you do. You ARE supposed to, and you WILL get something out of it. But that's not our motivation. Our motivation is, "I have what you need. That means I can give you what you need." Perfect love casts out fear, right? So we don't have to be afraid to give what we've got. We can live out of our abundance. God has lavished His extravagant love on us. We can lavish it on each other. We can give what we've got by knowing and believing that we've got it. We can stop chasing it and start enjoying it--by giving it away. By sharing it. By loving people!