love

More and More

| Marie Griffith

I began a ten-week study of the book of Philippians this week. I’m using a resource by Keri Folmar as a guide. Let me know in the comments if you’re interested in joining me in the study. I’d be happy to give you more information.

Philippians is the inspiration of this Monday School and I feel certain will be a source of several more in the coming weeks.

Paul’s prayer for the Philippians in chapter 1 verses 9-11 jumped out at me when I read it the other day. I’m currently reading the ESV Bible, but often pull out other versions to compare the wording in each. One of my favorite study Bibles is my NIV and this one is marked up and highlighted, with notes written in margins and passages dated.

On May 17, 2000, I marked the same prayer.  IMG_7015

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ – to the glory and praise of God.”                   Philippians 1:9-11

It was my prayer then and is my prayer now, that my love may abound more and more. A love that is grounded in knowledge and understanding, and knowledge and understanding saturated in love.

Paul told the Philippians why he prayed for their love to abound more and more at the beginning of verse ten. Different versions say it different ways.

The NIV – to be able to discern what is best
The CEV – to understand how to make right choices
The ESV – so that you approve what is excellent

My favorite phrase is in the NLT.  “For I want you to understand what really matters.” I love that. Paul wants our love to abound more and more so we understand what really matters.

Here’s the thing: we’re learning to follow Jesus as we’re following Jesus. We don’t learn everything then follow. We learn as we go. More and more.

It’s been 18 years of learning since I dated that prayer and I can confidently say I’m better at discerning what is best. I love better because God is causing my love to abound more and more.

In verse 11, Paul makes it clear that ultimately it’s all for God’s glory and praise. All the abounding love and knowledge and depth of insight. All the discerning what is best and growing more and more like Jesus. It’s to point others to Him.

I’ve marked today’s date at the top of Paul’s prayer for the Philippians in my newest Bible because I have more and more to learn about what really matters.

May our love abound more and more.

Photo by Michael Fenton on Unsplash

Full House

| Marie Griffith

I’ll share what’s been on my mind all day, although I’m not sure it qualifies as Monday School.

Yesterday, we celebrated Father’s Day with the grill going outside and the sound of the U.S. Open in the background on the inside. That’s the way we celebrated Father’s Day when Dad was here. I always thought Dad should get a break from the grill on Father’s Day, but he didn’t see it that way.

Now my husband mans the grill for all the other dads and when he’s finished with that, flips the channel back and forth from golf to rodeo.

We laugh and talk around the table. The uncles tease the little ones and the boys throw the football in the yard. The kids play tag and climb the rope swing and we pose for pictures in front of the prettiest tree.

Here we are, in the same house, all these years later, celebrating the important days much like we used to. Our house was full on Christmas and Mother’s Day and some other days too. It will be full again soon. Same love, new generation.

Good people, good food, good times.

And all I could think about was grace…..God’s boundless, beautiful grace.

 

Photo by Aral Tasher on Unsplash

 

 

Our Trademark

| Marie Griffith

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. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.
John 13:34-35

I’m not sure why, but the second verse was rolling around in my head all weekend and it prompted me to read the passage where it’s found and then some.

These words found in the Gospel of John are part of the final instructions Jesus gave to his disciples before he was arrested and crucified. With his public ministry completed, Jesus spent the last hours before his arrest with them.

I wondered about the new part, because this is not a new command. ‘Love your neighbor’ was part of the Mosaic Law from the beginning. Matthew Henry said in his commentary, “it is like an old book in a new edition corrected and enlarged. This commandment had been so corrupted by the traditions of the Jewish church that when Christ revived it, and set it in a true light, it might well be called a new commandment. Laws of revenge and retaliation were so much in vogue, and self-love had so much the ascendant, that the law of brotherly love was forgotten as obsolete and out of date; so that as it came from Christ new, it was new to the people.”

The commandment was new in experience. For the first time, the people had a perfect example of love in human flesh and they were about to see it in an even more powerful way.

So, love is how everyone will know we follow Jesus. It’s our thing….our trademark.

Love. That’s how everyone will know. It’s not the church we attend. It’s not our denomination, education, or accumulation. Our traditions, rituals, network, or political views. It’s not our Facebook posts, YouTube channels or Twitter feed.

It’s our love for one another. And it’s not just the kind that says the right words.

John wrote in his first epistle: “Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.’ 1 John 3:18

Then I remember what it says in Paul’s famous love passage:
“If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.”  1 Corinthians 13 MSG

Without love, we are nothing. We are ambassadors of Jesus, commanded to love like he did.

It would be easier to finish this post using the collective “we” because it keeps me from having to look closely at my own life and asking myself, “do people know I follow Jesus by the way I love others?”

But I can’t dodge the question and I can’t compare myself to others. I’m commanded to love as he has loved me and honestly, I mess it up a lot of the time. Most of the time. On my own it is impossible, but with God all things are possible.

He never asks us to do something without giving us what we need to do it. And what He has given us is Himself.

Later in John’s Gospel, Jesus says, “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.”

Without love, I am nothing.

Father, thank you for Your love and grace. Show me how to love others like You love me. Deliver me from the love of my own comfort and make me willing to serve others. Make me more and more desperate for You and keep me in the light of Your love. Show me Your ways and align my heart with Yours, so I see others the way you see them. Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a steadfast spirit within me. I love You.

Photo courtesy of Joanna Schley

Second Fiddle

| Marie Griffith

It seems odd that Paul wrote to the Roman church telling them to “outdo” one another. When I’ve ever wanted to outdo someone, it’s usually because I want attention or I want to be better at something. Basically, it was about me and me and me.

But the outdoing Paul wants us to do is not that kind. Romans 12:10 in the ESV says, “Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.”

Other versions say “honor others above yourselves” or “take delight in showing honor.”

The kind of outdoing Paul tells us to do goes against the kind of outdoing we’re used to doing. Instead of outdoing each other in seeking honor, Paul urges us to outdo one another in showing honor.

Jesus gives us an example of what seeking honor looks like. He warns his disciples about what they see some of the religious leaders doing in Matthew 23.

5 “Everything they do is done for people to see: They make their phylacteries wide and the tassels on their garments long; 6 they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats in the synagogues; 7 they love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and to be called ‘Rabbi’ by others.

Before we start feeling good about ourselves because we think we don’t do this, stop. We’ve all done it and do it, only without the phylacteries and tassels. We brag and gloat and work hard for people to see all the good stuff in our lives. This happens on playgrounds, in school cafeterias and on basketball courts. It happens on news discussion panels, in political speeches, and on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. It happens at home, work, the gym and church. Wherever any number of people are gathered, physically or virtually, this can happen.

My favorite translation of verse 10 of Romans 12 is from the Message. The last part of the verse says, “practice playing second fiddle.”

Just think how much would change if we practiced this.

What a difference between seeking honor and showing honor! The difference can mean changed lives and restored relationships. Better marriages, life-giving friendships, less conflict at work, peace and joy.

Unfortunately, I tend to seek it more than show it, but with God’s help, I will get better and better at the best kind of outdoing.

To find out more about Monday School, go here.

Photo by Jenn Evelyn-Ann on Unsplash

The Days of Our Lives

| Marie Griffith

Moses brings us our Monday School this week.

“So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.”   Psalm 90:12

Psalm 90 is a prayer written by Moses, the one who led God’s people out of Egypt, through the miraculously parted Red Sea, to the edge of the Promised Land. Instead of trusting God, the people gave in to fear and did not enter the Promised Land until forty years later.

Throughout the psalm, Moses writes a lot about time and stresses how quickly it passes. Maybe spending lots of time in the desert, dealing with rebellious people, and hearing all the complaints about water and manna gives a person a better perspective on time and the days of our lives. In verse 12, he prays for God to teach us to number our days. Moses wants to learn……and wants us to learn……to count our days so that we become wise.

How will numbering our days give us a heart of wisdom?  The main thing it will do is make us realize the brevity of our lives. But realizing how short our lives are doesn’t give us wisdom. In fact, it may make us more foolish….chasing adventures, careers, or bucket lists and filling our lives to the brim with things that don’t matter.

There’s more to it than just counting our days. Moses prays for God to teach us to number our days. God is the Giver of our Days and must teach us what to do with them. He must show us how to live them, because on our own, we tend to waste them.

If you’re wondering, like I am, how not to waste your days……we can’t go wrong with what Paul wrote to the church at Corinth which echo the words of Jesus in all four gospels:  Love God and love people.

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”              1 Corinthians 13:13  

We’ve been given the days, let’s make them count and live like it matters.

 

 

Hope Has Feet

| Marie Griffith

Last week I wrote about making headway. Sometimes the headway is painful. Sometimes it’s slow and feels like no headway at all. I used my running journey as an example because lately my running is terrible. My body hurts. I can’t get my breathing right. And my pace is off. Since then I’ve had two fantastic runs!

I came close to talking myself right out of the first one. It was freezing outside when I woke up before the sun. I dreaded the run already and had more time to dread it while my windshield defrosted. I struggled to be positive on my drive to the park, but I ran my goal and it felt great. And I had another good run today. Maybe I have my running groove back.

I do know this: If I hope to be a runner, I have to run. Or sometimes barely jog. Or maybe I alternate walking and running. But I keep at it. I do the work of running. So what if I go through a season of painful off-paced running? I still do it.

It’s that way with anything we hope for.

If we hope to publish a book one day, we make the time to write. We hope to go to grad school, then we find out what it will take and do it. We want to travel, then we do the work of saving and planning. We hope for a good marriage, then we learn to love our spouses the way we want to be loved, and do the hard thing of loving when it’s not easy. We hope for deep friendships, then let’s be the kind of friends that make it possible. Anything we hope for must be worked for.

Hope doesn’t wait around for something to happen. Hope is not an idle wish for things to get better. Hope has feet. Hope compels us to move forward. Toward our goals and dreams, and the people in our lives. Hope moves us patiently and steadily in the direction of all the good things, all the God things our hearts desire.

Even a long season of waiting can be a hopeful and purposeful time of growth. But hope always looks and moves forward.

What is it you hope for? How are you moving toward it? Have you ever lost hope?

Thank you, Joanna Schley, for the sweet photo.

Making Headway

| Marie Griffith

I’ve been running for over three years now. I went from believing I could never run to…….well……running. I’m not sure I’m any good at it. I’ve never experienced the “runner’s high” I hear about unless you count how I feel when I’m finished with a run. I’m elated after a run. Because it’s over.

And on my last runs, I felt as if I’ve never ran in my life. It was awful the entire time. Maybe it was because I woke up late and skipped parts of my routine. I rushed out the door before I finished my first cup of coffee because I was determined to get the run in before I had to be in the office. Within the first quarter mile I knew. My legs ached and my lungs burned more than usual, so I slowed my pace. The slower pace only prolonged the misery. The run never got better. I almost quit halfway through my goal, then I thought about quitting the rest of the time. But I finished.

When I read what Jesus thought when he saw his disciples in a boat on the sea it reminded me of my run and our lives.

“And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them.”  Mark 6:48

I can think of no better words to describe the hard parts of my journey. My running journey, the married one, the parenting one, my working and writing ones and the most important journey – the following Jesus one.

Making headway painfully.

Of course, it’s not always like that. There are days when it’s easy. Or easier. Good run days happen. I don’t let the bad run days stop me from working to get better at it.

It’s the same way on the other journeys. I can’t let the hard days of my marriage make me forget the good days. I don’t let the days when I feel uninspired to write any words prevent me from continuing my blog or steal my dream of publishing a book. On the days my parental decision making is less than wise I try to remember all the times it wasn’t.

And on the journey that matters the most…the one that affects all my other ones, I’m learning as I go. There are days I’ve let pride rule my heart, or acted selfishly. I’ve ignored what Jesus said about loving my neighbor or failed to do something good I know I should have done. But it happens less than it used to. I’m learning. Slowly at times. Painfully sometimes. But I’m moving forward and I’m never alone.

Jesus said, “Take heart, it is I”.  Mark 6:50

He sees. He knows when it’s painful and slow. And He’s there giving me the courage to keep at it.

I stumble…..but I’m making headway.

 

 

Love Me Tender

| Marie Griffith

Eleven days into my Lenten journey and I realize I’ve slowed down……a little. I’ve allowed for more quiet time in the morning….reading, praying, listening and reflecting, but I’m still trying to find a consistent soul-speed.

I’m reading a daily online Lent devotional and the Gospel of Mark during my Lenten journey. This week the story of a man with a withered hand in Chapter 3 struck a chord. Or maybe it hit a nerve.

Jesus walked into the synagogue and noticed a man with a withered hand. Some versions say his hand was shriveled. Others use the word deformed or crippled. Whatever word described it, the man’s right hand was useless. The same story in Luke 6:6-11 says Jesus asked the man to stand in front of the crowd.

Jesus wanted the people to see the man and his gnarled hand. Perhaps some in the crowd were moved to compassion. Some wondered what Jesus would do. The Pharisees and scribes looked for a way to accuse Jesus.

In all three Gospel accounts of the story, Jesus questioned the crowd.

“Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath or to do harm?”

“If your sheep fell into the ditch on the Sabbath, wouldn’t you lift it out?”

“On the Sabbath should we save someone’s life or destroy it?”

The four words at the end of verse 4 in Mark’s version say it all.

“But they were silent.”

No answers. Not a word. Only silence. The religious leaders were unyielding. The sight of the disabled man and the pointed questions did nothing to soften their hearts. They were consumed with the idea of catching Jesus in breaking the Sabbath.

I wonder about the onlookers, though. The other ones in the synagogue. Why didn’t one of them answer Jesus and say, “I would rescue my sheep” or “It’s lawful to save a life any day of the week.” Had they heard the man-made rules about Sabbath for so long they forgot what God said? Were they scared into silence? Afraid of what the religious leaders would do if they spoke up?

Verse 5 says, “And Jesus looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart….” 

Then Jesus told the man to stretch out his hand and it was restored.

Such a work of mercy should have tendered hearts and caused amazement and faith, but they wouldn’t be moved. They persisted in unbelief and set out to destroy Jesus. The ones determined to uphold the law missed the whole point of it: to love God and love people.

Are our hearts hard? Are we unmoved? Do we value man-made rules and traditions over people? Are we determined to move our agendas forward even when it means hindering others’ journey toward God? Are we holding onto status or position or reputation instead of trusting God?

Father, show us our hearts. Reveal the deepest places – the ones we try not to see. Make our hearts tender so we are moved by what moves You. May we love you wholeheartedly and may we see those around us the way You see them.

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  Ezekiel 36:26

 

Photo by Jamez Picard on Unsplash

 

 

 

Won’t Back Down

| Marie Griffith

This week’s Monday School is inspired by a story Jesus told in Luke 18:1-8. The story is called The Parable of the Persistent Widow.

First, we’re introduced to the judge. Jesus described him as one who had no regard for God or people and the judge admitted it. In other words, the judge was selfish and probably corrupt. Then Jesus told about the widow. The widow went to the judge over and over and over about an injustice she experienced. We’re never told what happened to the widow, only that she demanded justice against her adversary consistently and relentlessly. The judge grew weary of her continual demands and finally granted her the justice she sought.

Jesus made this point. If an uncaring, selfish judge will give proper justice to the poor widow, how much more will our loving God give justice when we seek it?

But the best part of the entire story isn’t the story at all. Verse one says, “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.” Another Bible version says, “always pray and never lose hope.’ Still another, “always pray and don’t lose heart.” My favorite part of the parable is WHY Jesus told the parable.

Think about it. The widow had no tangible resources. No network of friends that could help. She was poor, alone, and helpless. The only thing she had was grit. Maybe you call it moxie. Some say tenacity. Even so, I’m sure there were days she was as tired of seeing the heartless judge as he was her. Tired of hearing the same answer day after day. But she didn’t give up and she didn’t back down.

Jesus told this story so we would always pray and never give up. When it seems too hard and the waiting is too long. When the light at the end of the tunnel is gone. When it feels like we love or work or give in vain.

We pray and we don’t give up. We keep hoping. We keep loving. And we keep working.

This story makes me think of one of my favorite classic rock songs, I Won’t Back Down by Tom Petty. When I hear this song, I can’t help but feel more confident and determined about anything I’ve resolved to do. If you haven’t heard the song in a while, I encourage you to look it up on your music app and add to your playlist.

The lyrics are simple and powerful.

“I Won’t Back Down” 

Well, I won’t back down
No, I won’t back down
You can stand me up at the gates of hell
But I won’t back down

No, I’ll stand my ground
Won’t be turned around
And I’ll keep this world from draggin’ me down
Gonna stand my ground
And I won’t back down

(I won’t back down) Hey, baby
There ain’t no easy way out
(I won’t back down) Hey, I
Will stand my ground
And I won’t back down

Well, I know what’s right
I got just one life
In a world that keeps on pushin’ me around
But I’ll stand my ground
And I won’t back down

Let us pray and never give up.