Colossians 3:2
2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.
"We will wear compassion
We will wear it on our chests
And sing with love at our throats
Like a child, it's all I know"
Colossians 3:2 has always been one of my favorite verses, because it is all about focus. It is when we take our eyes off Jesus, off of eternity, off the promises of God that we succumb to sin and submit again to a yoke of slavery. This verse has really been weighing on my heart heavy lately so I have decided to let it serve as a theme for my next few blog entries. I read a quote and I think it's by C.S. Lewis and the general idea of the statement was when Christians stop thinking about eternity we become useless in this world and the next, because we lose a unified purpose on what truly matters, the eternal kingdom. I hope and pray that we can be characterized as a generation that remembers our citizenship is in heaven, and that this realization will transform how we spend our short time and resources on this earth.
On top of all of this love and compassion have really been on the forefront of mind. From listening to the As Cities Burn song Gates and reading through 1 John the theme of living a life marked by love and compassion has been reiterated multiple times. Last night I also had a very vivid dream after reading and meditating on the first three chapters of 1 John. I know this dream was from God, because it definitely spoke to me and struggles I have been having. But I feel like this is also something that I am meant to share with faith that God will change other people’s lives just like he has changed mine.
So in this dream I was walking with some friends and we came across this beautiful tall tree. And as we were admiring this tree we watch as this girl proceeds to climb it. When she got to the top without hesitation she jumped. Everyone was in shock and assumed she was dead so no one went to help her. I couldn't believe what was going on so I quickly ran to her to find she was still alive. I called 911 and they took us to this weird dystopian hospital/mental ward. When we arrived they kept asked me how they could help this girl and I responded "just love her." They told me they couldn't do that and I just kept repeating to them "you have to love her you have to she is hurting and she needs love." And like a broken record they kept saying "we cannot do that". It got to the point where I was screaming and crying at these people and then I woke up.
After reflecting more and more on this dream today three main meanings have jumped out at me.
1) Literal Meaning
1 John 2:10
10Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling.
When I woke up right after the dream my first thought was I have to love and have compassion for everyone like I did in that dream. I have to be that passionate about loving everyone in my life. I didn't even know the girl who attempted suicide in my dream and I think that's important. It doesn't matter who she was we are called to be imitators of Christ and His love to all. We are called to show grace and love and forgiveness to everyone even if we don't think they deserve it. Christ radically changed this world with love and we are called to do the same.
2) God's Love For Us
Romans 5:7-8
7For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
The more I thought about this dream I realized that this is also an allegory of the Father's love for us. God died for us when we were under a yoke of slavery to sin. Enslaved to the very thing God hates and finds disgusting. Yet He became sin for us so that we may attain His righteousness, because He loves us that much. That blows my mind. I am called to imitate that. You are called to imitate that. Are we really living this out? Are we really focused on the love that is from above? Are we showing the same grace to others Christ so freely gives to us? We obviously did nothing to deserve it.
3) Our Love/Lack of Love For Our Brothers and Sisters in Christ
1 John 3:14
14We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death.
Finally the more I thought about it I was struck by the oddity of the people who did nothing. Then it hit me how often we as a church body stand by idly when it is so obvious that the body is broken and hurting. We are just as much the people refusing to love the broken as we are the people demanding for love in this world. It's not Biblical and it's going on in our body.
Something has to change, and this only can be done through relying on the Holy Spirit and focusing on God's love from above. 1 John 4:19 says "We love because he first loved us." True love comes from the Father. It comes from above. It involves living like Jesus. Counting others as more important than ourselves. It won't always be comfortable. There will be suffering. These are all things we claim to know, but in many cases we look just like the world. Thankfully we are covered by the grace and love of Christ, but we have not truly received grace and love if we are not giving this back to the world. I pray that God will reveal to us what is holding us back from loving like this. I pray the Father will give us a passion to love others like Christ did. I pray above all that God will give us an understanding of true love.
Why don't we love like Christ?
Do I believe I can achieve total satisfaction solely through Christ?
Do I believe at my core that God loves me completely and fully?
It's my desire for us as a body to meditate on the Scriptures and these questions asking God for a passion to love Him and to love others. Asking God to transform us and to forgive us so that we can be made new and live a radical life for Him.
1 John 3:18
18Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
"Love is doing whatever you need to do to help people see and savor the glory of God in Christ forever and ever."
~John Piper
"We will wear compassion
We will wear it
And the gates of Hell
They won't stand, they won't stand against it"
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