By Pastor Steve Nickodemus

How’s Your Witness?

“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
1 John 4:10-11 English Standard Version

Jesus loves you!  What a wonderful message this is!  Love does not come from me, sinner and imperfect that I am, but love comes from God.  And how did that love come from God?  God loved us by sending his only Son to be payment for our sins.  What we could not do, what we did not deserve, God did.

And in the sending of his Son, God provided the way for us to be saved from the consequences of our own sin.  In a world full of lovelessness and selfishness, the Lord loved us by sacrificing his own Son and opening to us the way of eternal life.  And because God loved us in this amazing, life changing way, we also ought to love one another.

We ought to love one another in such a way that in words and actions, people hear and see and experience the love of God in Jesus Christ.  So, how’s your witness?  Are your actions consistent with your words?  I ask myself that question every time I put on a shirt that says, “Jesus loves you!”  Am I loving people around me, including my own family, in a way that reflects the love of God?  When people see me do they experience the love that Jesus gave to us?

And often I must repent of my lack of witness of love.  I confess that I have not loved as Jesus has loved me.  And as I repent, I experience, not the punishment of God, but the forgiveness and love of God that moves me to live that life of love that I have been given.

Lord, for the sake of Jesus continue to love me that I might evermore love others as you have loved me and so be a witness to all around me of your amazing love.  Amen.

Copyright Family of Christ Lutheran Church Colorado Springs, Colorado