To Lead is To Love

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Boy things in our world a little crazy. I'm really glad I had people early in my Christian life push me to memorize scripture, because in times like these, the value in hiding scripture in my heart is very apparent. One verse I memorized a while ago is Philippians 4:8:
Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think on such things.
Our world is a little crazy right now. Aubrey and I are personally doing pretty well, but there's a lot of fear and concern around our country. Ohio has been issued a "stay at home" order, and that's made a lot of people either lose their jobs or closed their businesses. This all means jobs are lost, bills can't be paid, businesses closing (maybe for good?). It all seems chaotic, especially when you look at what people are saying on the news.

This is why this verse is so important. We must focus on the positive things in our life. Optimism isn't ignoring the bad things, it's acknowledging that there are negative and positive things about every circumstance, and choosing to focus on the positive. Let's all use this COVID-19 issue as an opportunity to learn and practice obeying Philippians 4:8.
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I wanted to begin this blog post with that message mostly to encourage anyone of you reading this, but also as a reminder to myself. It's also going to be fun to look back and see what was going on during this time.

That said, I've been having my quiet times the last few days in John 13-15. In my opinion, John 13-17 is the most importance section of the entire Bible to really understand what is on the heart of Jesus (17 being the most important single chapter).

There is so much to learn from this section, but one thing that Jesus has pointed  is during this time, is that everything he's doing is teaching his men how to love, and he does this by loving his men. There's a phrase that I love: "Things are better caught than taught." In reading this, and meditating on it, I think loving people may only be learned through catching it. We can really only learn to love others by being loved.

I need to really think specifically how Jesus loved people, and do the same thing. I'm not going to pretend that my love for people is even close to that yet, but realizing how Jesus did is the best start I can think of.


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