Let Love be Genuine

I am a spiritual counselor at a local rehab center. About every 2 months I get the opportunity to talk to a group of people about the "higher power" they need to surrender to so they can begin their recovery and live life fully. I tell them that I am a Christian pastor and I claim God and Jesus his son, and the Holy Spirit as my higher power. However, I tell them that they are free to chose their higher power that works for them. I talk about about three guidelines for them to help guide them that they are choosing the right one. The first one I talk about is behavior: Does your higher power make you treat other people and yourself gentler or kinder? Out of our Judeo-Christian heritage, we have Jesus who sums up all the laws and the prophets in this, "Treat others as you want to be treated." I posit that no matter what higher power they claim, even when it is Christianity, if they are not loving their neighbor or worse, if they are hating or fearing their neighbor, then they have chosen poorly and they will not be healthy. If we are hating or fearing our neighbors, we are probably also hating ourselves. Every major religion boils down to this: how we treat, view, and love one another.

In our society right now, in our country right now, we are not treating each other very kindly, we are not being gentle with one another. Whether we are debating about wearing a mask or not, sending our children to school during the pandemic, Black Lives Matter, or who should be our next President, we are armoring up, we are attacking, we are filled with hate and fear. We, who are supposed to be a Christian nation, who are supposed to be a nation who trusts in God, and who are supposed to be a united nation, are a nation that seeks to be right, to have power, and to defeat, not win over, those who are opposed to our beliefs.

Paul is writing to a new church start, one that he didn't start, though be created many. Paul is helping this early, new church that has no history, no building, no by-laws, and even no Bible, no Gospel has been writing yet, though many of the Jewish/Hebrew books are floating around, but there is no official Hebrew Bible at this point. The letter to Romans is a good primer to any church, to any Christian. For all the theology, Christology, history, and thesis on sin and salvation, Paul breaks it down to where the rubber meets the road. What does all this mean? Let love be genuine! Let love be genuine! Let love be genuine! This little Roman church, even if it has 1,000 members, was swallowed up by a city of over 5 million people who believed there were many gods, many spirits, and many ways to live. Paul doesn't write to them about how to increase influence, how to win over the nation, or how to increase power, he writes about love, rejoicing, patience, and perseverance. Share with the saints, welcome the strangers, rejoice, weep, harmony, befriend the lowly, and do not return evil with evil, be overcome evil with good. Nothing about rights and privileges and prosperity and conquering and living the good life and loving our country.

We, as a nation, are failing this text. We, as a church, are failing this text. Almost everyone single one of us is failing this small paragraph in this nation. The good news is that Paul writes we all have sinned and fall short and God still loves us. That hard news is that we have to do better. If God's love truly takes hold in our hearts and lives, then we are to take up our cross and follow Christ. It's not about power, revenge, or even our or God's honor. It's about treating each other compassionately, even our enemies, even those who persecute us.

If we wait until the pandemic is over, if we wait until the election is over and our side wins, if we wait until the protestors and rioters go home to start trying to repair the breach, then we have already lost. If we continue to unfriend, avoid, and hate each other and not recognizing the face of God in each other, then we have already lost. But we worship the God whose love is infinite, whose grace is unconditional, and who has shown us that even death itself cannot stop the purpose and kingdom of God.

Let us allow the God of love to transform our hearts and lives so that we may live in harmony with our brothers and sisters of our nation and of the world. Let us treat each other kindly, this the is true way, the best way to share the gospel, the good news, and the kingdom.

Sabbath

In the Five Books of Moses where also known as the? (Pentateuch) What was the last thing written of the Pentateuch, the last story? Hint: it was a poem. (The First Creation Story) The Seven Day Creation Story was put in its final form, the first time it was written down was while the people of Israel were in the diaspora spread throughout the Babylonian Empire in the sixth century BCE. It became widely shared because the prophet Jeremiah told the people to marry amongst the people wherever they were at and to settle in. Yes one day, they would return to the towns and Jerusalem, but for now, continue to live. The people of the nation of Judah were there for about seventy years, so there were a couple of generations happening and their children and grandchildren were forgetting their language, their heritage, and their God. Then, the poem about God creating the world in seven days was used as a reminder, a balm, and a way to remember who and whose they were. It centered on the sabba...

For They Were Afraid

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Covenant of the United Church of Christ

That they may all be one! This was the dream of the these different denominations and churches coming together in 1957. That they may all be one! While many denominations were splitting and continually finding reasons that they couldn't be siblings with those Christians over there, a group of mainline Protestant leaders came together that united and uniting was the future of the Church. Yes, it was mainly four major denominations which are: 1. Congregational 2. Christian 3. Reformed (German) and 4. Evangelical Synod (Lutheran). There were many other smaller groups that joined as well, that included Back, Native, and Hungarian. But if you look at the first General Synod picture, it was pretty much white, middle class men. With global communication becoming easier, travel, television, and the United Nations, they had a dream and vision that all Christians could live together, worship together, and be one as we are one in God with Christ. That they may all be one! is the United Churc...

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