The end of summer is near.
We have played, swam, and slept in. We have cleaned out clothes too small, retired school books and filled the shelves with new. We have disposed of hoards of trinkets from who knows where. We are signed up for basketball, martial arts, ballet, and fall classes. We are ready to begin a new school year. Or are we?
Big changes are on the way. My oldest will be driving within the month, my middle child will officially be in high school with an eye on the US Air Force Academy-Go Falcons! We are frantically figuring out high school requirements and transcripts so we don't find ourselves missing anything. My baby isn't a baby anymore. All she can talk about is starting 1st grade, cheerleading competitions, and what! Boys?! She said she "likes" a boy. What. Does. That. Mean. At age 6? TIME SLOW DOWN, PLEASE! I'm not sure my heart can take all this at once!Amidst our fervor to prepare for what's next, last week more terrifying events unfolded before our very eyes. These were not acts occurring on the other side of the world, in some distant land where unrest festers and oppressed people feel desperate for change. It happened here in our own back yard, Charlottesville, VA. It isn't the first time. Baltimore, Ferguson, Berkley, D.C., Chicago...
I Googled "riots in the US" and a long list stretching back to 1783 appeared: Nat Turner's Slave Rebellion, Detroit Brothel Riots, Know-Nothing Riot, anti-Chinese riot in LA, Buffalo riot of 1967, Days of Rage, Boston Bus Riots, Kent State shooting/riots, Battle of Evarts (right here in KY), and so on... Hundreds of bloody riots all over the US, all throughout our history.
I am an unofficial cultural anthropologist of sorts. I ponder people, culture, places and how people related to each other. I love people. They fascinate me. I could spend hours on the street just observing how people relate to the environment around them. I talk to people. A lot of people. From many different parts of our country. One thing that resonates, without exception, is individual desire to create a better world. To do good. To leave a legacy. I have met a smidgeon of people who have any hostility to any specific group of people-latino, Baptists, Louisville fans, or other. The US is literally full of people with a common vision to create a better country where every person can pursue life, liberty and happiness.
So what's up?
I have been seriously pondering this for many years.
I really think it all comes down to LOVE.
The Bible tells us that God is love. (1 John 4:8) Without God we cannot know love.
OK, many will say this isn't true, God is not required for love-"I am not a believer and I love my kids, my dog, my husband."
The Bible also explains this. There is human love and there is the love that comes from the Spirit of God. Those who are filled with the Spirit experience what 1 John 1:5 describes as "walking in light". For those without the Spirit the experience of love is a feeling. Mark 7:21 tells us that "from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts." The love flowing from the Spirit serves the other. The love flowing from the human heart serves self. The two loves are diametrically opposed to one another. One serves, the other takes. Dietrich Bonhoeffer explains in his book "Life Together" that "human love becomes personal hatred when it encounters genuine spiritual love, which does not desire but serves."
"Human love can never understand spiritual love, for spiritual love is from above; it is something completely strange, new and incomprehensible to all earthly love." Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Fellowship with God also allows for peaceful fellowship with each other. (Ephesians 2:14)
God is our Peace App.
Christ's death, burial and resurrection gave us a way to reconcile with God. Christ made peace between us and God. Christ also made peace possible between men.(1) Without Christ we cannot have peace with each other. I Thessalonians 4:9-10 tells us that God is the one who teaches us to love one another.
God is the source of LOVE.
Without HIM our efforts will continue to fail miserably.
In the end, humans cannot live without community with one another. Our nature of selfishness will spoil it every time unless we tap into a genuine, faithful source of peace and love.
TRUE STORY...
One day, Jesus was talking to a woman at a well.
She may have been planning to do the washing that day. Maybe she was bathing her children or maybe she was thirsty. Whatever the case, she had to make that long trip to the well in the center of town and lug heavy jugs back to her home, every day. It was a laborious routine, but you can't live without water, right? Jesus came along and offered her water that would relieve her thirst, her need for water, forever-A perpetual spring within (NLT). She jumped at the offer.
She may have been planning to do the washing that day. Maybe she was bathing her children or maybe she was thirsty. Whatever the case, she had to make that long trip to the well in the center of town and lug heavy jugs back to her home, every day. It was a laborious routine, but you can't live without water, right? Jesus came along and offered her water that would relieve her thirst, her need for water, forever-A perpetual spring within (NLT). She jumped at the offer.
He offers us the same thing today. A well-spring of SPIRITUAL LOVE. A love that serves and does not desire to be served. He offers PEACE with our neighbor, whatever the differences between us.
TAKE IT!
It is a never-ending,
perpetual spring of
life-giving,
love-making,
peace-offering
LIVING WATER!
Do you have questions about life-changing reconciliation with God, please go to www.considerchrist.org or contact a church near you.
(1) Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Life Together. Harper Collins Publications ©1954. p. 24
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