Today, four people from our year got baptized. Some I know well, some I don't really know at all, but one thing was so clear - God is good and is working in each of them. And us. Things like this always leave me with so many feelings and it's a little hard to be coherent sometimes. However, I'm seeing more and more just how broken and deceitful we humans are. It's hard to believe that God still puts up with us - and not just puts up with us, but loves us. This word "love" - I really think I need to stop using it so much to describe things that I like or that appeal to me. Is that really what the word "love" really means? Aren't I just watering down this wonderful, wonderful word and sticking it with a lame, worldly definition?
This is what the Bible says love is:
"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command." John 15:12-14
"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:8
"Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the LORD forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity." Colossians 3:12-14
This is love. This is love the way God loves us. It is pure, sacrificial, not self-seeking, unselfish, and good.
But yeah, back to today's baptism. Thinking about my own testimony and the sin in my own life, it is honestly a miracle that I am saved. Nothing I have ever done, no effort that I have ever exerted of my own will could have helped me in the face of the holy wrath of God. It's crazy and I can't really wrap my head around it, but then I remember this: "Jesus looked at them and said, 'With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'" (Matthew 19:26). It's like, "of COURSE, you silly girl". I remember while we were just hanging out right after the baptism, I overheard one of the guys who had just gotten baptized say something along the lines of how he couldn't believe people were still so enthusiastically and lovingly greeting and encouraging him after his sharing, because he had done things that were so wrong and heartbreaking or whatnot, but it's amazing because it's like, isn't this the love of God? "Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God." (1 John 4:7)
Out of the overflow of our hearts we speak and act. I pray that whatever comes out of my mouth and whatever thought enters my mind and whatever step I take with these feet, it will spring from love - the love that God has enabled me to demonstrate, and is continually teaching me how to demonstrate.
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