JESUS, MY ONE TRUE LOVE!

Thursday, February 14, 2008

JESUS, MY ONE TRUE LOVE!
TRUE LOVE

What a wondeful journey life has been for 51+ years with my darling husband. He knows how to do it! His love for me has been amazing.

He is the one who allowed me to grow enough in God to become proficient in Living From the Life of Christ and not from my limited resources of my own self-life.

Dan is the one who demonstrated the true love of Christ for me, like the kind of love Jesus has for His Church, His Body.

Dan demonstrates the love we find characterized by Jesus's nature and described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-9:

1 Corinthians 13:4-10 (The Message)

3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.

   Love never gives up.
   Love cares more for others than for self.
   Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
   Love doesn't strut,
   Doesn't have a swelled head,
   Doesn't force itself on others,
   Isn't always "me first,"
   Doesn't fly off the handle,
   Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
   Doesn't revel when others grovel,
   Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
   Puts up with anything,
   Trusts God always,
   Always looks for the best,
   Never looks back,
   But keeps going to the end.

8-10Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

Even though I feel very complete within my husband's love, I know it is not perfect love. Only one person in the universe loves perfectly. That is God.

While we are talking about love -- let's talk about the Divine Lover -- Jesus.

Jesus is God in a human body, living a perfect sinless life, taking us to the Cross with Him (in Him) so we could live in resurrection power His very saving Life. That's love at it's best!!

Please understand that I realize none of us live perfectly out of the saving Life of Jesus Christ -- but you should have seen us before Jesus Life invaded our bodies! We were hopeless and had to do things our own way. We were ruled by selfish ambition and wanted nothing to do with anyone telling us anything differently.

When we received Jesus as our Savior, we didn't know He was to BE our Life. We just thought He would Help us feel better and get our lives straightened out so we could get along better with others. We wanted Him to fix us, to make us happy, and to let us go our own way without all the maladies of our past.

Jesus had other things in mind. He intended to Life HIS Life through our mortal bodies, giving us the privilege of yielding to His design for our lives.

That fact is the basic difference in those who call themselves Christians.

It is the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus which is joined to our human spirit and is the energizing, life-giving factor which makes us alive to God. Born in sin, and being spiritually dead to God, we are in need of someone to save us from our situation. We are not taught to sin. We just do it instinctively. It is the root of sin which has to be destroyed in us -- that of personal autonomy from God.

Jesus comes to take us captive out of the enslavement of self and sin. There is a better way. It is the way God designed our bodies to operate -- with Him as our 'inside us" God, making His home in our innermost being.

That is not possible unless there is a supernatural impartation by God Himself -- putting Himself into us. . . and making our bodies containers for God-Life. It is exactly that which happens when we place our faith in Jesus Christ and recieve Him into our bodies as the Christ of the Spirit.

No longer the Christ of the Flesh- Jesus in human form- we are the ones who have acknowledged Him as the Crucified Savior for our sins and have acknowledged that we cannot possibly do away with our rebellion against God's Kingdom without His intervention.

Most of us tried.

We did everything the Bible says to do to make it work.

But, if Jesus is going to be our Lord, it has to be an inside job on His part. He does not rule from elsewhere. He must have reign over our internal beings -- and He comes to live in our spirit where He can rule over the body, mind, soul and spirit as we allow Him Lordship status in actual time.

Jesus, the Perfect Love of the Universe, comes to Love us perfectly. He loves us like none other can, because only God is perfect love.

All other loves pale in comparison to Jesus' love to us.

All other loves pale in comparison to Jesus' love through us.

All other loves pale in comparison to Jesus' love -- period!!!

If you want to know love. . . know Jesus and let Him love you as you are. Let Jesus love you into becoming what you were designed to be as a lover of people around you. Let Jesus love you into becoming what God knew all along would be your most intentional living for His glory. . .accomplishing what only you can accomplish in the hands of a Perfect Lord!

Having a husband love me through the stages of my growth in Christ, I am eager to maintain this incredible relationship we enjoy in life serving Jesus. There is no other directive in our life which guides us other than that of being His and His alone . . .and fulfilling His Divine Command to take Him to the nations in order that they come to obey all His commands -- thereby allowing people to experience the lavish love of God and the unforced rhythms of God's abounding grace.

Have a Happy Valentine's Day! Enjoy Jesus. He is Perfect Love! Out of His Love comes our love for each other in our marriage. We are still growing and maturing in our love for each other and for our family and Christ's church - here and worldwide. Until He comes -- we will enjoy Jesus! Life in Him is fabulous!