Brown's Daily Word 4-29-08

Good Morning,
"Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God, for God is love. (v. 9) In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. (v. 10) 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. No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in Him, and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him." This passage is taken from 1 John 4, one of the greatest passages on Love. In September, 2006 sociologists from Baylor University in Waco, Texas, in conjunction with the Gallup organization, released the results of a study looking into America’s different views of God. The Gallup organization is a statistical research group which was founded by the late George Horace Gallup (1901-1984), an American statistician. This Gallup poll identified four distinct views of God’s personality and interaction with the world. Baylor researchers outlined the results as follows: 1. Those who believe in an "Authoritarian God" - a God who is "angry at humanity’s sins and engaged in every creature’s life and world affairs" - 31.4 percent. 2. Those who believe in a "Benevolent God" - a God who is forgiving and accepting of anyone who repents - 23 percent. 3. Those who believe in a "Critical God" - a God who "has His judgmental eye on the world, but he’s not going to intervene, either to punish or comfort" - 16 percent. 4. Those who believe in a "Distant God" - a God who is more of a "cosmic force that launched the world, then left it spinning on its own" - 24.4 percent. In which of these categories do you find yourself? Does the "Authoritarian God," the "Benevolent God," the "Critical God," or the "Distant God" align more with your thinking and you heart? I, personally, believe in the "Benevolent God" and I would like to share with you this morning some reasons why I believe in God's benevolence. In 1 John 4, we read "God is love!" Almighty God does not just have the ability to love; but, that He is love. Love is a description of Who God is, not just of what He does! According to Holy Scripture, this God Who is Love desires nothing more than He desires to share His love with each and everyone of us! Author Richard Armstrong, in "Make Your Life Worthwhile," reported a story about a man in Wales who sought to win the affection of a certain lady for 42 years before she finally said, "Yes." The couple, both 74 years of age, recently became "Mr. and Mrs." For more than 40 years, the persistent, but rather shy man slipped a weekly love letter under the door of her home, his neighbor’s house. However, she continually refused to speak and mend the spat that had parted them many years before. After writing 2,184 love letters without ever getting a spoken or written answer, the man eventually summoned up enough courage to present himself in person. He knocked on the door of her home and asked for her hand. To his delight and surprise, the formerly reluctant lady accepted! Now, try to imagine how God has shown mankind His love down through the ages, through history as we know it! Time and time again, He tried to get His message of love through to His human Creation, both male and female, with little or no response. Finally, He wrapped up His message in Person; His love for us was displayed in the Person of Jesus Christ! The late, great, Dutch Christian and holocaust survivor, Cornelia Johanna Arnolda ten Boom (1892 - 1983), also known as "Corrie ten Boom," in her autobiogaphy, entitled, "The Hiding Place," shared this true story about a time after her release from the concentration camp when she was speaking at a church. "It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former S.S. man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there - the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie’s pain-blanched face. He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing, 'How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein,' he said. ’To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!’ His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side. Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? 'Lord Jesus', I prayed, 'forgive me and help me to forgive him'. I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer, ’Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness.’ As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me. And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself."
In Jesus ,
Brown
Kind words can be short and easy to speak but their echoes are truly endlessMother Theresa
Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are traveling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kindAmiel, Henri Frederick
The course of human history is determined, not by what happens in the skies, but what takes place in our hearts. Keith, Sir Arthur
Life is a journey, and love is what makes that journey worthwhile. Unknown
Love is the beauty of the soul.St. Augustine
He who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare, And he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere. Ralph Waldo Emerson