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Love God by Loving Others

            I have realized lately how easy it is for me to get my ‘butt on my shoulders.’  The littlest things can irritate me anymore.  Normally it deals with other people and their actions.  For instance, if I see someone who is, in my mind, doing something I deem as inappropriate or for lack of a better term; stupid, then I tend to get pompous and preach on why they are wrong.  Mind you, the person I am talking about is never around.  To be honest, the only person who hears my unnecessary rants on the actions of others is either my wife or the pixeled image coming across my television screen.
            I find it so easy to point out the flaws in others and play a game of “if that were me I would have…” with myself.  My wife, being the sane one in the family during these fits I throw, politely responds with a simple, “honey, perhaps you don’t know the full story” or something else that almost sounds as if she is defending the person I am chastising.  Although she means well, since I am in my fit of anger, I take it as if she is supporting the other person and not me.  I know this not to be true afterwards.
            Today, I opened up my Bible to a random page and read 1 John 4: 19-21, “We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.”

            SMACK!  That was the sound of God hitting me upside the back of my head.  God has called me (us) to love those he has put around us.  By getting angry and cynical with the people placed around me isn't showing the love of Christ.  It would be easy for me to point the finger and chastise someone, but God has called me to treat these people as myself and to show them love.  And taking a piece from my last blog, truly praying for them.  I pray that you will join me in showing our neighbors and brothers and sisters the true love of Christ.

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