“You have been taught to love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you this: love your enemies. Pray for those who torment you and persecute you—  in so doing, you become children of your Father in heaven. He, after all, loves each of us—good and evil, kind and cruel. He causes the sun to rise and shine on evil and good alike. He causes the rain to water the fields of the righteous and the fields of the sinner. It is easy to love those who love you—even a tax collector can love those who love him. And it is easy to greet your friends—even outsiders do that! But you are called to something higher: ‘Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect'” (Matthew 5:43-48, The Voice).

Chris Brooks, Kairos pastor, made a point in his sermon that I’d honestly never thought about. He said that Jesus used the main character in the parable of the Good Samaritan for a reason. Jews and Samaritans did not get along. In fact, to the Jew at that time, there were no more hated enemies than the Samaritans.

What Jesus was saying in effect is that the enemy is your neighbor. When He says to love your neighbor and later on to love your enemy, they are often one and the same.

Who is the enemy you are called to love? Who is the one who Jesus calls you to pray for who persecutes you and torments you and basically makes your life a living hell?

Chris said that this is not promoting passive acceptance of abusive behavior toward you. What he’s saying is that you trust God to set things right.

Maybe your enemy is your boss. Maybe it’s a co-worker. Maybe it’s an actual neighbor down the street. It could be a family member. It could be those Trump supporters or those liberals out of Hollywood. Possibly your worst enemy is yourself and that inner critic that never shuts up or goes away.

Whatever the case, Jesus doesn’t give any opt-outs for this command. He set the standard high. In fact, He set the standard so high that only though the power of the Holy Spirit in you can you possibly live up to it.

It’s not easy, as with most of Jesus’ teachings, but it’s more than worth any pain or sacrifice if it makes you a little more like Jesus in the end.

According to my Apple watch, I set some new personal records.

I burned 1,551 calories, I exercised 219 minutes, and I put in a grand total of 31,039 steps and 15.71 miles today.

No wonder I’m tired and my feet hurt.

My challenge to you is to strive to be better today than you were yesterday.

If you succeed, you can set the bar a little higher the next day.

If not, you can always try again tomorrow.

Today, I had the amazing privilege of witnessing a girl making a public profession of the fact that she received Jesus as Lord a few weeks back. She will be baptized next week, and a host of angels in heaven and a crowd of people down here will rejoice.

I was a bit stunned as she was a church attender and had been in the same life group as me for a while. At the time, I assumed, as did probably everyone else there, that she was a believer.

I was also extremely grateful for the grace that can save anyone anywhere at any time. Once again, I learned that it’s never too late for God’s plan of redemption to take effect in someone’s life.

I also was reminded to never assume when it comes to someone’s salvation. Just because a person does Christian activities like attending church services or reading their Bible doesn’t mean that person has saving faith. They may know of Jesus and know about Jesus and not know Jesus.

It also encouraged me to never give up praying for those loved ones who I’m not sure about their eternal destiny. It may take 5 days or 50 years, but God has a way of showing up in a person’s life at just the right moment in time.

As my pastor has said, it’s a blessing when God gives you a front row seat to witness His work in the world. In this case, I believe it was nothing short of a miracle that God worked in the life of one new believer whose life will never ever be the same again.

Every now and then, something will show up in my Facebook memories that I had completely forgotten about. Tonight, a poem appeared that I had posted 8 years ago.

I posted it for the beautiful words and deeply heartfelt expression (and not because of anything I was going through personally at the time.

I hope it will speak deeply into your soul:

Broken Cry

“Distill my soul with your blood,
marring the pride I hold tight,
until it crumbles and slips
past my wounded clasp.

Flow through my broken veins,
breathing deeply in my mourning.
Open my stubborn eyes,
to the beauty of your mercies severe.

Bend my shattered world,
crushing the pieces,
collapsing my life.
Surrender my tears to prayer
and bow my heart at your feet.

Clothe me in brokenness,
birthing my suffering heart,
through the pressures of my sorrow
that shine in the power of your grace.

Rain down holy tears,
filling the springs of my heart,
pouring the light of your promise
into my soul’s darkest night.

By Christi Armstrong – http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1222802324

Copyright 2010 Christi Armstrong

“What we call ‘being in love’ is a glorious state, and, in several ways, good for us. It helps to make us generous and courageous, it opens our eyes not only to the beauty of the beloved but to all beauty, and it subordinates (especially at first) our merely animal sexuality; in that sense, love is the great conqueror of lust. No one in his senses would deny that being in love is far better than either common sensuality or cold self-centredness. But, as I said before, ‘the most dangerous thing you can do is to take any one impulse of our own nature and set it up as the thing you ought to follow at all costs’. Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You cannot make it the basis of a whole life. It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all. Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go. And in fact, whatever people say, the state called ‘being in love’ usually does not last” (C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity).”

Love isn’t a feeling.

Actually, love is an action that encompasses but transcends feelings.

Love of any kind– whether for spouse, family, friends, or even pets– is an act of the will, a choice.

If you truly love, you do acts of love even when you don’t feel love.

Ultimate love is that while we were yet the enemies of God and sinners, Christ died for us.

We can only love at all because God in Christ first loved us.

In case you missed it, it’s August. I mean, in case you failed to look at any calendars and avoided anything with the current date on it, it’s August 1.

What?

These days, I feel like I’m just beginning to get to know a month, get familiar and comfortable with it, and boom! it’s gone. I feel like the weeks fly by and days are over before my coffee fully takes effect. I heard something about that happening to old people, but I forget where I heard it from.

But the good news about August 1 is that fall is inching closer and closer. Sure, us Tennesseans still have at least 2 more months of hot sticky stupid hot weather, but crisp breezes and rainbow leaves are on their way.

That means pumpkin spice everything will be coming soon to a Starbucks near you. I might even break out a flannel shirt in the next day or so. Not to wear but to look at it and yearn for flannel weather.

So, happy August, everyone!

We’ve been going through the book of Jonah the past three Sundays at The Church at Avenue South. Probably anyone who has spent sometime as a kid in Sunday School knows how Jonah is the one who got swallowed by the whale (or more accurately, big fish).

Recently, thanks to some good teaching, I’ve come to see the book a little differently. I see now that the main character of this little book isn’t Jonah, but God.

Jonah is an interesting fellow that I can relate to. A lot. When God calls him to Ninevah, he goes in the complete opposite direction, about as far as you can go in the wrong direction.

Even in the belly of that fish, Jonah essentially prays that God will allow him to go back to Jerusalem to give an offering at the temple. He basically says, “Eh, let’s just forget about the whole Ninevah thing. That wasn’t a good idea anyway.”

Jonah’s message of repentance seems to lean more toward God’s judgment than God’s offer of forgiveness. It’s almost like he’d rather see the city destroyed than for the people to change. After the whole town repents, Jonah throws a hissy fit and sulks.

I can take great comfort in the fact that the good that comes from the book comes not from Jonah’s obedience but from God’s faithfulness. I can trust that God can work in me even in my moments of half-hearted obedience and lukewarm worship.

Does that negate the command for me to pursue God wholeheartedly? Not at all. It simply means that I don’t have to be perfect and have my life all together for God to use me where I am.

I’m not the main character in my own life story. God is. The more I recognize and remember that, the more I will be amazed at what God does in and through me.

“Sometimes we experience a terrible dryness in our spiritual life. We feel no desire to pray, don’t experience God’s presence, get bored with worship services, and even think that everything we ever believed about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is little more than a childhood fairy tale.

Then it is important to realise that most of these feelings and thoughts are just feelings and thoughts, and that the Spirit of God dwells beyond our feelings and thoughts. It is a great grace to be able to experience God’s presence in our feelings and thoughts, but when we don’t, it does not mean that God is absent. It often means that God is calling us to a greater faithfulness. It is precisely in times of spiritual dryness that we must hold on to our spiritual discipline so that we can grow into new intimacy with God” (Henri Nouwen).

Monday is where  the proverbial rubber meets the road. It’s where we reenter the real world after a weekend of relaxation and rest and worship (or maybe for some of us it’s just another day after a weekend of working).

The important thing to remember is that God is greater than our feelings and so is our faith in Him. The joy we are called to transcends feelings.

The key is to trust God and keep doing what you know He’s called you to do. Keep practicing the disciplines of the faith — Bible reading, prayer, meditation, meeting together with other believers.

God will be just as faithful on Monday as He was on Sunday.