Application of God's Word: 1 John 3:16
Verse: 1 John 3:16
By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us.
And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
Application:
Real love is an action, not a feeling. It produces selfless, sacrificial giving.
The greatest act of love is giving oneself for others. How can we "give up our life"? By serving others with no thought of receiving anything in return. Sometimes it is easier to say we'll die for others than to truly live for them - this involves putting others' desires first. Jesus taught this same principle of love in John 15:13 .
John 15:13
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.
Deception's Promise
Jerimiah 6:13-15
“Because from the
least of them even to the greatest of them,
Everyone is given to covetousness;
And from the prophet even to the priest,
Everyone deals falsely.
They have also healed the hurt of My people slightly,
Saying, ‘Peace, peace!’
When there is no peace.
Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination?
No! They were not at all ashamed;
Nor did they know how to blush.
Therefore they shall fall among those who fall;
At the time I punish them,
They shall be cast down,” says the Lord.
Jeremiah was given a difficult assignment. He was called to
preach destruction to a people who would never believe him. He knew up front
that his message would fail. Other prophets would succeed with their false
message. But God told Jeremiah to preach the truth anyway.
We live in an age of acceptance. Anything goes. Morality,
we're told, is relative; truth is too complicated to pin down, commitment is
defined by the mood of the moment, and there are many different paths to “God.”
Tolerance is a code word meaning, “Don't preach to me. I've got no
intention of changing.” The false prophets of our age have a clear, persistent
message: “Peace, peace.” But there is no peace.
How we wish peace would come. We pray to the Prince of Peace
and ask Him to rule our lives. He does, and He will. But He will fulfill the
message He preached long ago in Galilee and Judea: God will judge the human
revolt, and Jesus is the only way to escape the judgment.
That's not a popular message in an age of acceptance.
Nothing will bring out intolerance in the “tolerant” ones like a message of
exclusive redemption. But like Jeremiah, Christendom is faced with a choice:
Preach the truth, even where it goes unheeded, or lie about the condition our
race is in and the judgment that awaits it - all for the sake of “peace.”
Deceptions abound in our world. Most of the effective ones
sound pleasant to our ears; otherwise, they would not deceive us. God's Word
sounds pleasant, too, but only to repentant ears. To the pride of
self-sufficiency - the drug of choice for the human ego - His Word is anathema.
It is as thoroughly rejected as Jeremiah was. But it is true.
Our generation has brought significant challenges to our
faith. Our beliefs are not for the faint of heart. But as Isaiah promised,
God's truth is the only water that quenches thirst and the only bread that is
filling (Isaiah 55:1-3). Cling to it. Drink and eat of it with gusto. Stand
firm in a truth-impaired generation. And never fall for the false promises of
secular prophets.
[An excerpt from "The One Year Walk with God
Devotional" by Chris Tiegreen]