HERE IN THE REAL WORLD

What’s love got to do with it? That is the question Tina Turner asked so many years ago. (And, yes I am old enough to remember when she rolled on the river!). But today is love nothing more than a word we toss around carelessly? Is it another word that we have watered down the meaning of? Tina said it was nothing more than a second hand emotion. What is love?

The word love (translated from a few different Greek words) is used 212 times in 183 verses in the Bible (ESV). Hate, by contrast, is used only 13 times. So there seems to be some importance attached to the word LOVE. And, rightly so. John wrote, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love” (1 John 4:8). The very God that we say we worship is LOVE. But, how can we worship a God that is love and yet harbor hate for some many of our brothers and sisters?

If the very God that we worship is love should not our lives be overflowing with that very same love? Should our love not be inward and not motivated by self but our love for others? God gave Ten Commandments in the Old Testament and then in the New Testament the commands are cut down to two: And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31). Looking at the Ten Commandments, the first 4 show a love of God; the next 6 a love towards our fellow man. The embodiment of the commandments under both covenants is one thing: Love.

So what’s love got to do with it? Everything!

This week I am doing a guest blog over at The Preacher’s Pen. Several gust writers will be writing the next 6 weeks. Please stop by and see why we like the Church.

And Don’t Forget Next Month is a special month at “Here In The Real World”. We will have several guest writers all writing on the topic of UNITY. Here is the list of writers:

Chris Stanley- Campus Minister at Mid Atlantic Christian University

Chris Gallagher- The Preacher’s Pen

Paula Harrington- Paula’s website

Tim Archer- Kitchen of Half Baked Thoughts

Doug Young- douglasryoung.net/

Trey Morgan- Treymorgan.net

John Dobbs- Out Here Hope Remains

If you are in the area come see me at the ROANOKE ACRES CHURCH OF CHRIST

Until next time May The Good Lord Bless And Keep You: All Y’all!

As I write this today the baseball world is mourning the loss of New York Yankee owner George Steinbrenner. The “Boss,” as he was known, was known for being able to put together a team that would almost always be in contention for the championship. He would always seem to come up with a team of greats. He knew it took a team. One cannot think of baseball without remembering some of the great players of the past, and some of the great quotes they made. So, today, once more, I turn to the “diamond” for a little theology and find out that it takes a team.

Former Chicago Cubby Vance Law said, “When you’re in a slump, it’s almost as if you look out at the field and it’s one big glove.” Sin in our lives is the same way. When we stumble and sin, the jaws of even more sin is waiting to devour us. Our desire for pleasure, fed by the sin, seems can never seem to be satisfied. One sin will lead to another and to another until we find ourselves deep in the pit and mire of sin totally living away from Christ.

James said that we are to “Therefore, confess [our] sins to one another” (James 5:16). We bring in our brother/sister in faith and let them know where we have failed, or where we are about to fall. That small act of humbling ourselves can take the weight of the world off our shoulders. It throws darkness into light. And, we all know when we turn on the lights the darkness is gone. It makes us accountable.

We live in a world where we think we can handle everything on our own. Unfortunately for some many of us that is not the case. And, when what we are trying to handle is sin it sometimes even gets hard to handle by ourselves. It takes a team. The writer of Hebrews wrote, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Hebrews 10:25). We are to encourage each other. We are to encourage others just as they are to encourage us. We can get all the self help books money can buy, but there is only one that helps with sin: The Bible. And, it encourages us to rely on the help of our brothers and sisters in Christ. It takes a team.

Baseball has long had a history of “greats of the game.” We cherish the memory of what these guys did on the field. Our faith is no different. The writer of Hebrews wrote, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin” (Hebrews 12:1). Our scriptures are filled with great stories of faith, and all around us great men and women of faith still bare witness. We need let these witnesses encourage us. We need to let them build us up not just in our time of need, but to refuel us at all times. It takes a team.

Former Yankee Billy Martin once said, “I may not have been the best Yankee to put on the pinstripes, but I am the proudest.” In our Christian walk it is a great thing that we don’t have a Father that keeps statistics like Major League Baseball does. If that was the case we would none be considered “best Christians” because all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). But we serve a God that forgives and does not count our sins: I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins (Isaiah 43:25). When we rely on our teammates and follow the leading of our perfect Manager we can get past the sins that plague us and separate us from the Father. It takes a team!