Thoughts from daily Bible reading for today – December 31, 2019
Let love be your highest goal. 1 Corinthians 14:1, NLT
Some time ago, I spoke with a retired woman who said she couldn’t identify her purpose. “I don’t know why I am here,” she shared.
My heart went out to her. Like many people—and like I have at times—she wondered what she was called to do. This woman often uses her time to serve others. She drives elderly friends to the doctor or to church. She makes quilts for the needy, and she bakes for church gatherings.
But because she isn’t doing something “big,” or because she has never had a professional career, she thinks she doesn’t have purpose. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Matthew 22:35-40 shows God’s greatest two commandments for our lives are to love. Love is our highest purpose.
”Jesus replied, ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.’”
So, if you are a teacher, and you love as a teacher, you have fulfilled your God-given purpose. If you are a construction worker, and you use your work to love, you have fulfilled your God-given purpose. If you are a writer, and you use your work as one who puts words on a page to love others, you have fulfilled your God-given purpose. And, if you make quilts for the poor, and it’s done in love, you have fulfilled God’s greatest purpose for your life.
Every gift, all talents, and all types of work are simply channels through which we can fulfill our highest purpose to love. What a relief for those times when we wonder, “Why am I here?”
When we focus on what we do as our purpose, we miss the point. It’s not about what we do as much as it is about how we do what we do. Do we do it in love?
All things must be rooted in love to be rooted in God.
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 in the New Living Translation says:
“If I could speak all languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had a gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor, and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.”
All things must be rooted in love to be rooted in God. And, you have purpose because you can love. Let that sink in! What a marvelous thought!
“Let all that you do be done in love”(1 Corinthians 16:14).
Prayer
Lord, how I praise you that my time on the earth can be meaningful, rich, and filled with great joy when I tap into your truth that my greatest purpose is to love. Help me see the opportunities I have all around me, every day, to express love to others. Amen.
Application
Take time to think about what gifts or talents God has given you. What is your work? How can you use it as a channel to love, even in what may seem small insignificant ways? All acts of love matter to God, big and small.
Related Reading
Galatians 5:13-14; 1 Timothy 1:5; John 13:34-35
Post/Tweet today
What we do is secondary to why and how we do what we do. #WisdomHunters #love #truth #Jesus
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