Jesus is patient and kind; Jesus does not envy or boast; Jesus is not arrogant or rude. Jesus does not insist on His own way; He is not irritable or resentful; He does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Jesus bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Knowing the love Jesus has for us is an encouraging thought. This paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 was suggested in a devotional I read in 2021 [1] for John 13:34 – “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” James Boice said that we are not to “love” in any way we see fit, but as Jesus loved, which the above describes.
Based on John 13:34, Boice says we should be able to substitute “I” in place of “Jesus” and see what He commands us to be. When I re-read the first paragraph with myself in mind, I see how much I fall short, but His love for me remains an encouragement. He will be patient and kind with me.
Pray that we may get ever closer to living the love of Jesus.
[1] From “August 30.” James Montgomery Boice and Marion Clark. Come to the Waters: Daily Bible Devotions for Spiritual Refreshment. (2017).
A recent survey said that only 9% of American adults have a “biblical worldview.” I’m generally skeptical of polls unless I know how they were done. After looking into this one, I wonder if I fall in to the 91% of American adults who don’t have a “biblical worldview.” Why? In their definition of “biblical worldview” the word “love” was nowhere to be found. Maybe they thought “love” was too hard to define to base a survey on. If so, I can understand because love is a complicated thing.
In this survey, “love” was not in the definition, but “absolute moral truth” is, which bothered me not because truth is a bad thing, but because moral law is what condemns us. Moral law would still exist if Christ had not died for us. The Gospel, or Good News, of Christianity is that we can be saved despite failing to follow the law. Truth without love is like describing Easter and leaving out the Resurrection. If we have not love, we have nothing but condemnation. Love is essential.
But what is love? Love means many things to different people and is a word people like to leave undefined or use to mean whatever sounds good. Often people agree that “we should all love each other” without knowing what exactly they’re agreeing on.
Confusion about what love is has been around for a long, long time. The Bible itself talks about several different kinds of love, making a “biblical worldview” definition harder. In English translations of the New Testament, the word “love” shows up over and over again, but the Bible wasn’t written in English. I’m no Greek scholar, but what follows is how I personally understand “love,” and I hope it clarifies rather than confuses.
In Greek, there are at least 4 words for love, including these three:
Eros – sexual or passionate love
Phileo – this is a root of “Philadelphia”, literally the city of brotherly love. Loosely, phileo means an affection for people who are “brothers,” who we like because we admire something about them, or because they are like us.
Stergo – This is a love toward kindred or family, typically between parents and children. This love is like a loyalty to those we are related to by blood.
These words and ideas were part of the culture in which Jesus lived, died and rose again over 2,000 years ago. However, the writers of the New Testament Bible couldn’t line the meaning of these words up with what they wanted to say about Jesus. Therefore, they took a little-used word – agape – and poured new meaning into it.
A Better Love Agape is epitomized by the act of Jesus dying on the cross, but also by His selfless love for others repeatedly demonstrated in the gospel records of His life. Agape is putting the interests of others above the interests of yourself, even if there is no benefit to yourself, or even if there is a significant cost to yourself. Even if those others don’t love you. Agape motivates acts of benevolence or charity.
Why is love so important to a Christian worldview? Not only because if God didn’t love the world, He wouldn’t have sent His only son, but also because if individual Christians leave love out of their worldview, they use “absolute truth” as a reason to judge. Love that requires sacrifice may be less popular than love that doesn’t, but without it there is no cross.
As I see a Christian worldview, this kind of love is absolutely essential. From it comes a framework of the entire history of God’s relations with man in three phases: love rejected, love redeemed, and love restored.
Love Rejected While vague “love” is popular, true agape love is not. When I took a college class on Interpersonal Psychology, one of the topics was the multiple meanings of love. The professor explained the multiple Greek words used for “love”, but when he got to “agape” he asked if anyone in the class could explain because he didn’t “understand” it (or so he said). I raised my hand, answered by describing the self-sacrificial love of Jesus, and was snickered at by much of the class. The professor smiled at me and moved on to the next topic. He probably set up the same situation every semester. So, yes, not only does the world often not know what “love” means in a Christian sense, but they actively ridicule it when it’s explained to them.
From Adam and Eve right to the modern day, agape love is the bonds that mankind seeks to break and find their own way. In an earlier post, I wrote that the “bonds” and “cords” that the world tries to break free from in Psalm 2 are the laws of love for God and for our fellow man. Jesus summarized all the commandments of the Bible as: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind”, and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”[1]
I recently wrote that “the problem with every person individually is that they are unable, no matter how much external pressure is put on them, to treat other individuals the way they should be treated.” People like to ask or demand that others practice agape love, but usually for the benefit of themselves. It is not in our nature to demand it of ourselves first whether or not anyone else reciprocates.
Love Redeemed People also usually like the idea that every person gets what they deserve – but we are less likely to talk about that for ourselves than for others. The justice of God demands that anyone who refuses – at any time – to love Him and to love their neighbor should get what they deserve. He does not miss anything but is perfect in His justice. Jesus had to live the perfect life of agape love, under the loving guidance of Our Father, not so we won’t have to, but because we can’t. Without Christianity and without love, the world would never be able to overcome the “Love Rejected” stage.
Christianity is not judgement, but the only way of escape from it: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16). If man had not rejected love, Christianity wouldn’t be necessary; but also, if Christianity does not restore mankind to agape love, it’s pointless. Jesus, by willingly giving the ultimate sacrifice of Himself, satisfied God’s perfect justice and perfect love simultaneously.
By rising from the grave, He is able to share with us the power of agape love, which governs and redeems the other loves:
Eros – So many of the personal and societal problems in the world are driven by unconstrained eros. In agape, God provides boundaries within which eros benefits, rather than harms, humanity. See an earlier post on Godly Offspring for how God prevails over unconstrained eros even when we fail.
Phileo – Unconstrained phileo, which can become what we call tribalism, is behind a lot of the racism, sexism, xenophobia, and other group conflicts in the world. This also is nothing new – God through His Son will redeem us. I wrote about agape overcoming tribalism in an old post about Jesus reaching out to Zacchaeus the tax collector.
Stergo – Families might be expected to be the easiest places to love each other, but they are often where passions run hottest. James 4:1 says “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?” Only agape provides what is needed to bridge the divide, a love to govern stergo.
A Christian in our world has a restored relationship with God but is only able to practice agape love imperfectly while awaiting a new body in a new heaven and a new earth.
Love Restored The Bible does not contain a lot of specifics about the eternal life that Christians inherit and it is often misunderstood. For example, those who think of Christianity as a set of rules that make us “perfect” think they are right to ignore the hope of heaven. C.S. Lewis says sometimes “our notion of Heaven involves perpetual negations: no food, no drink, no sex, no movement, no mirth, no events, no time, no art.”[2]
But thinking of heaven as love restored helps understand it better. Elsewhere Lewis reframes heaven as: “When human souls have become as perfect in voluntary obedience as the inanimate creation is in its lifeless obedience, then they will put on its glory, or rather that greater glory of which Nature is only the first sketch.”[3] By obedience he means obedience to loving God and man, and in heaven every person’s ability to love will be as the laws of nature, as reliable and predictable as the rising of the sun every morning or the return of leaves to the trees in the spring.
Also, we will not become something entirely other than what we are now, like an angel, but will be transformed and perfected, while retaining our individuality. Pastor Tim Keller explains that “Our future, glorified selves will be continuous with who we are now, but the growth into wisdom, goodness, and power will be infinitely greater.”[4]
This is a future worth having.
How to Have This Love For those who agree that the agape love we lost is the love we need back, Jesus alone is the Way, the Truth and the Life. He offers a world where every individual person uses their individual talents, gifts and creativity in the best interests of others. All you have to do is agree to do the same, redeemed by His sacrifice and empowered by His Spirit to do the will of the Father.
How do we accept this offer? “…if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.” – Romans 10:9-10
If you haven’t already, ask Him to be your Lord and Savior.
Nobody is more or less Christian than Jesus makes them. No doctrine or experience can replace a loving, personal relationship with our Maker and Lord, who guides and empowers us to love as He does. If we have not love, we have nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). Fortunately, in Christianity we have His agape love if we will accept it above all other, lesser loves. Christianity is not Christianity, and we are not fully ourselves, without it.
[1] From Matthew 22:37 and 39 [2] Lewis, C.S. The Weight of Glory (1941). P. 107 [3] Ibid. P. 43 [4] Keller, Timothy. Making Sense of God (2016). P. 170
Although highly allergic to cats, I love the two we have, but sometimes wonder if it’s worth the trouble. This past Saturday night, one of the cats, named Misty, was up crying much of the night, waking us up regularly. Eventually, I realized she must have been upset about her litter. The store was out of the “usual,” so I tried to get away with a replacement, even though I know how finicky cats are. Sure enough, once I changed it to what I had left of the usual stuff (kept in reserve in case of finicky cat trouble), she stopped complaining.
Why am I telling you this? Because what happened next reminded me that God is concerned about even the most minor details of our lives, and about every living creature He has made. Sunday morning my reading schedule began with Psalm 8, which includes this:
“You have given [man] dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.”- Psalm 8:6-8
Misty, an indoor cat who may feel like she’s trapped in the ark.
Under the mandate given in Genesis, mankind is supposed to take care of whatever God has given us – the earth and everything in it. My study Bible helpfully noted that this includes pets, which reminded me of Misty’s crying! I thought maybe our cats were worth the trouble after all, but God wasn’t finished making the point.
Also on my reading schedule was Genesis 7, which includes: “And the waters prevailed on the earth 150 days.” – Genesis 7:24
During the flood, Noah and his family were flooded in the ark for 150 days with two of each kind of animal (but seven of each kind of clean animal, because provision was made not only for the survival of Noah’s family, but also provision for continued worship of God). After the 150 days, they had to wait months longer for the waters to recede and the land to dry before coming out of the ark. Noah’s family took care of an ark full of animals for more than 150 days. They probably lost a lot of sleep! As for me, I only have two cats and get to leave the house. I also have allergy medicine to make it more tolerable.
Looking back at Psalm 8, the last verse declares: “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”
This Lord is the same one who brought Noah, his family, and those animals through the flood. He also cares about my family and even my pets. In seemingly small acts like taking care of pets God has given us, we can declare the majesty of God’s name! In whatever influence we have, big or small, God wants us to participate faithfully in the work started at creation, with the authority He has given us.
In addition to perhaps cats, what else might we be allergic to? Sin is not just a list of things we shouldn’t do, but it is our allergy to God’s dominion over the world and the way we each should have dominion over it and under him. We’re too often allergic to loving this world the way he did on the cross, yet we claim to hope for a world where that sacrificial love governs 100% of all actions.
Our Lord wants nothing more than to greet us in Paradise and say “‘Well done, good servant! Because you have been faithful in a very little, you shall have authority over ten cities.’”[1] He literally died to make such a greeting possible. Therefore, consider what creatures or people our Sovereign God has delegated to each of us. What tasks or roles? Jobs or ministries? Do some of those things irritate and annoy us, as if we were allergic?
In aggregate, the church’s role is to have dominion over His entire creation, but not in the way the world would, exploiting everything for our own benefit and casting aside what doesn’t seem useful, but as a servant would. Like a God who abhors all our sin as if He were allergic but decided to cover our sin with His own precious blood. The same blood that covers us so that, like a compassionate Father, our Lord can gently say on a Sunday morning after a bad night of interrupted sleep:
“Be thankful you aren’t stuck in an ark for 150 days with thousands of animals.”
According to James Boice (see first post in the series), if you asked people to honestly describe their needs, they might describe one as: “We…have wills, and because we have wills, we want to achieve something. We want our lives to make a difference. To do that we need power.”[1] This is a second need of us all, according to James Boice. In Isaiah 9:6, Jesus, the Christ of Christmas, is described as our Mighty God, who Boice says “will empower us for life’s tasks” – those tasks He points us to in His wisdom.
The word Mighty probably calls to mind miraculous events, military victory, or superhero-like powers. But ultimately, His greatest objectives for us – to love Him and to love our neighbor – are what He uses His might to accomplish. When our Wonderful Counselor (see last post in series) gives wisdom to make a choice in life, He actually wants us to act on that choice because He knows how it will turn out – for our ultimate good – but what if we don’t agree with the choice, or don’t have the willpower to make it?
God, unlike Lucy in the Peanuts comics, will not tell us to kick the football, then pull it away at the last second, leaving us on our back. To those who trust Him, He will provide the ability to make a loving difference in the world. As Mighty God, He puts His own resources and power behind His recommended wisdom to produce the desired effect of loving, godly living.
Put another way: “His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence,” as written in 2 Peter 1:3. He does not empower us to do just anything, or to do whatever we decide; He will empower us to “life and godliness.” In wisdom, He knows this is what is ultimately worthwhile, and His power creates a new desire and a new influence in us, molding our wills that want to make a difference but may not know how. His power also works in others to provide what we need, or works to put in our path someone who needs us.
The gift of Jesus as Mighty God meets one of our deepest needs: “To achieve something worthwhile! Jesus is the Mighty God who enables us to do that. We accomplish worthwhile things through his power.” (Boice)
Do you want to achieve worthwhile things this Christmas and in 2023? Our Mighty God wants to enable us to love Him and love others. Seek the wisdom of Christ and become empowered by Him to love as you have never loved before.
As someone who collected comics years ago, I love the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies. The decades of characters and stories created in the comics combine with modern special effects to create the ultimate “popcorn” events. Thor: Ragnarok, released in 2017, was one I really looked forward to since I had read the original Ragnarok story line that culminated in The Mighty Thor issue #353 in March 1985.
(Caution: Mild movie spoilers follow!!!) The movie’s conclusion is significantly different than the comic version, with a twist that the heroes decide victory lies in not fighting the “Big Bad” of Surtur, a massive fire demon. However, after realizing this, they must convince the Hulk to follow the plan, resulting in one of the funniest exchanges in any of the MCU movies:
Thor: Hulk, no! Just for once in your life, don’t smash! Hulk (in sullen voice): But big monster!
You can watch the 1 1/2 minute scene here:
Hulk logic is simple. Big monster is here. Hulk must smash big monster. That’s the plan.
In Part 1, Jesus was pictured in Psalm 2:4 as being enthroned in heaven, laughing in derision at the rulers of the world who sought to break free from His “bonds” and “cords”. This description of Jesus is a reassuring reminder to us that no worldly kingdom is a threat to Him, and we can trust in His protection. The post ended with a question of whether we also laugh as Jesus does? Do we hold our (and His) enemies in derision?
Peter Smash! Here we began with a Marvel movie scene, because in a way, Thor convincing Hulk that fighting fire with fire wasn’t the answer is like Jesus’ rebuking of Peter for fighting back against the mob that arrested Jesus, and soon delivered Him to be crucified. In John 18:1-11, Judas leads a “band of soldiers and some officers” to arrest Jesus, and Peter (possibly thinking “Big Monster!”) drew his sword and cut off the right ear of one of the high priest’s servants, named Malchus. Jesus says “Peter, no! For once in your life, don’t smash”, or as more accurately rendered in the ESV: “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
Matthew’s account (26:52-54) adds: “Then Jesus said to him, ‘Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the Scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?’”
Jesus knows that He can beat any “Big Bad” the world has to offer at any time with an “appeal to my Father”. In Psalm 2:5-9, right after He laughs, the Psalmist writes:
“Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, ‘As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.’ I will tell of the decree: The LORD said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.”
But rescuing His people must come first, and until then final judgment is delayed. Jesus knew when Psalm 2 was written that He would eventually judge all the nations, but He also knew what sort of death He would die to accomplish salvation for His people. Jesus does not laugh because His enemies can be taken lightly – He is fully aware of the evil of the world. His enemies cause real pain and suffering on earth, and He takes each offense personally. But if He decided to spend all of history laughing in heaven, we would all be without hope. Fortunately, He lived among us, and suffered terribly as a servant, knowing “that he had come from God and was going back to God”[1]
At the time of Judas’ betrayal, Jesus had told His disciples multiple times, citing Old Testament prophecy, that His plan required being rejected, suffering, and dying, then rising again[2], but when the mob came for Jesus, Peter didn’t make the connection. He did not understand the plan, but later he would. We are not alone when we don’t understand God’s will for us. The twelve disciples were constantly out of step with Jesus. When asked to do something against our natural impulse we sometimes drop our shoulders, and our voice becomes sullen like Hulk’s.
But we have hope. Years later, Peter would write about his progress from his early impulsive days in 1 Peter 1:13-15:
“Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct.”
The “passions of Peter’s former ignorance”, may include the time Peter cried “big monster!” and cut off someone’s ear. None of us are immune from the same Hulk logic when threatened. But it might also be said that Jesus looked at Peter in derision when he did this[3]. But for the grace of God, there go I.
Peter writes of the implications of understanding Christ’s mission on the cross, that Christ’s followers are part of the plan, as active participants in the mission. He calls the church to be holy, set apart for God’s purposes, to pursue the mission of the church, most succinctly spelled out at the end of Matthew’s gospel: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (28:19-20). In this kingdom, the two most important commandments are: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind”, and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”[4]
To answer to the question at the end of Part 1, the prescriptive truth that is like Proverbs 14:21[5] is love. Love defines how subjects in the kingdom of the One who laughs should behave. A love more thoroughly defined in 1 Corinthians 13 as patient and kind, and not envious, boastful, arrogant or rude[6]. Or, as Peter wrote in 1 Peter 2:1: “So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.” Paul adds in Rom 12:14 – “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.”
Jesus laughing in heaven is only a comfort to us if He is our King, and if He is our King, we seek to follow the laws of His kingdom. The laughter of Jesus is not a model for us, but is a source of comfort and strength if we are His. In contrast, the nations, kings and rulers of this world refuse the “bonds” and “cords” of the Lord, which are these laws of love. They make up their own system of “righteousness” by laws, and therefore “the Lord holds them in derision.” Their earthly rules and systems cannot measure up to His righteousness and are at best narratives and at worst tyrannies.
Love When Bad Things Happen Jesus’ laughing is precisely what enables us not to hold people in derision, and to not mock and laugh at them. It is a key to achieving the “Us for Them” ethic described in an earlier post. Jesus laughing tells us that there is no monster scary enough to make His plan to love the wrong answer. Whatever your circumstance, “Love God”, “Love your neighbor” and “Love your enemies” apply to it.
To illustrate this, consider Jesus’ prophetic speech in Mark 13:5-23 from the framework of descriptive vs. prescriptive truth. I paraphrase and categorize some of the points below:
Descriptive
Prescriptive
Many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he!’
See that no one leads you astray
You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, and nation will rise against nation
Do not be alarmed
Earthquakes and famines in various locations
Be on your guard
You will be beaten in synagogues, and you will stand before governors and kings for my sake
Bear witness before them and do not be anxious beforehand what you are to say
Brother will deliver brother over to death and you will be hated by all
Endure
False christs and false prophets will arise and perform signs and wonders
Be on guard
To Jesus, none of the things in the descriptive column are new information. All were included in the plan. The actions He recommends are not new information either. The “Prescriptive” column means keep doing what you were doing before these bad things happened – Love God, love your neighbor. Even if your neighbor is “bad”.
False christs and prophets will cry “But big monster!” and offer to save us. But the true Christ calmly says “be on guard; I have told you all things beforehand”. (Mark 13:23). The false prophet takes the descriptive of evil in the world and creates their own false prescriptive. They recommend an incomplete and inaccurate narrative as an ultimate solution. Their own Babel which God must “come down” from heaven to even see (Genesis 11:5). The true Christ comes down from heaven and demonstrates how to create a true ladder all the way back to heaven, offering forgiveness to all, even those who refuse to accept it or practice love. He will be thoroughly and eternally glorified by manifesting His kingdom as the only eternal kingdom, ruled by love.
God doesn’t turn our Muerte into Morty by having us laugh at him and beat him up with a stroller (although that might be fun). He doesn’t tell us to Smash! Every time we try to follow the plans of the world to fight the battles of God’s kingdom, we are testifying that the world’s kingdoms are greater than His. Our rage will be futile and our plotting will be in vain.
Witness to the Cross Note that the presence of false prophets, national rivalry, and natural disaster provide an opportune backdrop for proclaiming the superior kingdom of God in Christ, where none of these things will occur! We testify to the imagined utopias of the world – which are all at best narratives and at worst tyrannies – that the real utopia is one where people love so much that they are willing to die for specific others, not one where the “Pax Romana” is illusory and pointing that out is a crime. Jesus even died for the tax collector Zacchaeus, described by his Jewish peers as a traitor and cheat, a representative of a secular enemy power. Everyone He died for was once His enemy, and His sacrifice enables a paradigm shift from “Us vs Them” to “Us for Them”.
In our ability to do this, we all lie somewhere between the impulsive Hulk, the Peter of Matthew 26, the Peter of his New Testament letters, and Jesus’ obedience on the cross. We each are a narrative of our own “intricate matrix of beliefs, at different levels of truth and of conviction on every possible topic.” We all cry “But big monster!” at different things, at different times, and for different reasons, but Jesus guarantees our destination is holiness when we follow Him. Jesus cares about His people more than he cares about all the kingdoms of the world, and “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” – Matthew 5:10.
But His blessing is not granted under all types of persecution. Persecution is not evidence of righteousness, but a result of it. Christians are not blessed when persecuted for unrighteousness, which sadly they often are. They are blessed when persecution comes from testifying to, and striving to live, a righteousness that is unachievable by any earthly kingdom. Jesus did this on the cross, and we do it by bearing the cross He assigns us. When we do this, His kingdom comes, because his will is being done on earth as it is in heaven.[7] Logically, earthly kingdoms do not like this.
Therefore, “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.” (1 Peter 4:12-14)
Don’t accept the cross anyone other than Christ assigns to you – it may crush you. The specific work God assigns for you is enough and comes with His power. Our cross will not kill our soul; it will enable us to truly live.
For the last enemy to be defeated is Muerte. Which means death[8].
Next post: a “minor’ prophet finds peace
Post Script To close out the discussion of Psalm 2, the last verses (10-12) describe the Psalmist pleading with the kings and rulers:
“Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.”
Finally, as Paul urges us in 1 Timothy 2:1-2, we should pray for our rulers to God, who is sovereign over the nations: “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.”
[1] See John 13:3, and a previous post about this idea. [2] Mark 8:31, Luke 9:22 and elsewhere [3] As in Matthew 16:23, where Jesus refers to Peter as Satan for saying suffering was not necessary for our Lord. [4] From Matthew 22:37 and 39 [5]“Whoever despises his neighbor is a sinner, but blessed is he who is generous to the poor” [6] 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 [7] Adapted from Matthew 6:10 [8] 1 Corinthians 15:26
Driving Toward the Morning Sun 