So, today’s inspiration for a blog post actually came from the sermon I heard in church this morning. I loved it so much that I shared the quote on my Facebook, but I felt like talking about the importance of it. For those of you who may not know, I currently attend an amazing Church called Harvest Bible Chapel here in Marion while in college. Our Pastor is Pastor Taylor Frank, and he does an incredible job each week of preaching FROM the word and not just WITH it, which really fills my spiritual bucket every week. He also does an incredible job mentoring me as a young person going into ministry.
So today, in his sermon, he was preaching on Matthew Chapter 21 and was talking about the importance of building a foundation when it comes to our relationships. He said, “The only way to get person-to-person relationships right is to get the Person to God relationship right first.”
You see, at the end of the day, all things in our life stem from a relationship with Jesus Christ. If we don’t have that, we have nothing. In this world, you can have the biggest house, the fanciest car, and all the Gucci clothes you want, but if you don’t have a strong relationship with your heavenly father, none of that means a thing. It’s only because of our relationship with God that we get the privilege of having relationships with others. You see, in the gospel of Matthew, Jesus is asked, “Which is the greatest commandment in the law?” and he replies, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like, “Love your Neighbor as yourself”. I think I really just love the simplicity of that passage. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it. It’s just simply “Love your Neighbor as yourself.” Even when we have disagreements, even when our neighbors aren’t the nicest to us, even when our neighbors don’t believe the same things we do. The word still says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Pastor Taylor’s point though was that if we don’t love Jesus, we can’t love others. All things root from that relationship with Jesus, including our relationships with others.
Having others around you is SO important. God didn’t design us to live by ourselves. If he did, he wouldn’t have created Eve for Adam. God designed us to live in community with one another. Everyone that God puts into our lives is there for one reason or another, even if it doesn’t seem like it. I’m so blessed that he’s put such amazing people into my life to really push me closer to him (and to pick up the phone at 2 in the morning when I struggle and need help) 🙂
My prayer as we go into this week is that, as a body of believers, we can pour out God’s love into everywhere we go this week. In Classrooms, in interactions with others, and just in the everyday moments. God loves us more than we can ever imagine, so therefore, we should love others just as he loves us. I hope you all have an amazing week!