By Dr. Leigh Marlar
John 15:9-17 - “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other."
Revive…renew…fresh start…resolution…whatever you want to call it, I love a new beginning! A blank slate, a do-over. Maybe it’s because I make so many mistakes!! I am a daily beneficiary of God’s amazing grace. I rejoice in the promise that his mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23 says “the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness”).
As a school counselor at an elementary school, January is one of my favorite times because we work on learning about and practicing kindness and empathy. My school participates in a kindness challenge every year where every student, staff member, and family is challenged to do as many kind acts as possible in a week. While it may seem trivial to some, to me that is exactly how we begin to change our world. Small acts of kindness and showing love to each other.
This is God’s command to us in John 15—love each other. I don’t know about you, but it feels to me like we have a serious lacking of love for each other in our culture today. My prayer this year is to focus less on myself and more on loving God and others. The two go hand in hand. We cannot truly love God without loving others. After all, God created us all, in His image, we are all His children, His family. We must treat EVERYONE with love.
I certainly cannot do that on my own power. I can barely love my own family all the time!! The good news is that I don’t have to rely on my own power. If I give all control over to God, He will help me. He will show me the way.
My personal theme for 2021 is “nothing is better than You.” This is a phrase in the song “Graves into Gardens” by Brandon Lake and Elevation Worship. It is my reminder that nothing in this world, no person, no material item, no idea, no place…NOTHING is better than YOU, the almighty Creator of all, the Living GOD.
If you are following our “Daily Bible-Reading Plan,” today's passages are John 15 & Psalm 147.