The Greatest part 4
The greatest thing you can do is love someone. And the greatest love you can have is to lay down for life for them. Think about that for a second. Laying your life down. Putting someone else in front of yourself. Someone else's needs, or wants. Esteeming someone else higher than yourself. That's pretty great. But it's also impossible, unless you understand that that's exactly what Jesus did for us on the cross. He didn't just tell us what the greatest expression of love is. He SHOWED us. He layed His life down in the literal sense. He proved that He would literally rather die than be without us. He gave His life for us. And He gave His life to us. So now we have His life. Now we can partake of the Divine Nature. Now we can live a life of love. We can lay our lives down. We can give instead of trying to get. Give our lives to each other. Because Jesus gave His life to us. And that's what the New Commandment is. A New Man needs a New Commandment, right? "So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other" (John 13:34 NLT). Just as Jesus loved us, we should love each other. Just as He laid His life down for us, we should lay our lives down for each other. There it is. The greatest thing we can do. Striving for greatness by focusing on how loved we are, and then letting that love overflow out of us. Naturally. Not trying really hard and inevitably failing. Not faking it until we make it. But simply receiving and releasing the gift we've been given. Sharing what we've got instead of trying to get something we (think we) don't have. And remember, in order to be great it doesn't have to be big. It doesn't have to change the world. Sometimes the smallest expressions of love can change one person's world! Sometimes just the effort of being there for someone else--putting their needs and desires ahead of your own--is enough to give them something to believe in. Sometimes that's just what they've been hoping for. And remember what we started this Rant series with: "Three things will last forever--faith, hope, and love--and the greatest of these is love" (1 Corinthians 13:13 NLT). Faith, hope, and love. If you can help build someone's faith, and give them what they've been hoping for, by loving them... that's world changing. Hope deferred makes the heart sick. And faith is the substance of things hoped for. It's all connected. Because it's all about love. Love is what we all hope for. It's what we all want so desperately to believe in. It's the greatest thing in the universe. And when we know and believe that we are loved, when we CAN love on another (and thereby obey the New Commandment), we are doing what we were created to do. We are doing the greatest thing we CAN do. And I'm telling you, even though it IS a sacrifice, when you love someone, laying your life down for them doesn't FEEL like a sacrifice. It feels like an honor. It feels like joy unspeakable. It feels like the greatest thing in the world!