the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,
Memory of the Month:Proverbs 15:1-A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Today's reading: JEREMIAH 24-26 TITUS 2
The Search for Goodness
Psalm 27:13 I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living! 14 Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!
It must be hard to be an officer of the law anywhere in this world. They are to serve and protect. Protect us-from what or whom? The unlawful. They must believe that anyone is capable of wrong doing. That is how they must live. We need to pray daily for all of them. It must be so hard to live that way but I am so glad that they are there for all of us. Pray for them all to search for the goodness of the Lord in this land of the living-to believe they can see the goodness of God in this lifetime.
But, then, we must ask this for all we pray for and ourselves as well. To find something we must look for it. To see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, we must look diligently. Again, we must seek God and His kingdom first but part of this is looking for the goodness of the Lord.
I know a man, pretty well I think, who goes to work everyday and deals with the public as he sells his goods. I know he has some customers who are not happy about anything any time. But he is always calm and smiling. I do not know anyone who has ever had a bad thing to say about this man because he sees God's goodness everywhere he looks. He is a devout follower of Christ.
Paul wrote to Titus about what he should do and how he should act in his ministry. As Paul writes to Titus in chapter 2, we can hear Paul tell Titus to teach the men this and the women that but at the same time, I believe Paul is encouraging Titus to use personally all these things in his own life.
The last verse of chapter 2 says: " These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you."
I must admit that in my years, I remember the 'rebuke' part more than I remember the 'encourage' part. I strongly urge us to see that we must encourage with great energy.
Paul says earlier in the chapter the reasons for this teaching.
...so that no one will malign the word of God
...so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us.
...so that in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive.
...to purify for himself(Christ Jesus) a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.
Paul had seen and was seeing the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living and was encouraging Titus in ways that would teach him how to do the same thing.
The goodness of the Lord in this life is seen in the lives of human beings. Yes, we can see creation and how great God is from all of it, but the goodness of the Lord is a personality trait of God. God is good. People who follow Him live out that goodness for the world to see.
There are some who have allowed themselves to become jaded and can only be suspicious of everyone. How can you see goodness if you are always critically judging someone?
Judgement is God's job. Ours is to see His goodness because we spend enough time in His presence to know how good God is and from that we recognize it in the behavior of others because we are looking for it. We will look for the part of everyone that is created in God's image. We are always looking for a reason to speak for God and the hope He has planted in our hearts-if we are seeking Him and His kingdom.
If you do not look for the good in people and hold them suspect, you have work to do-and we all have work to do-God's work. We all have growing to do and learning. One of the hardest lessons to learn is how to look for the good when everything looks bad-when we are in pain in sickness or when our country makes decisions that are contrary to God's heart, just to mention a few things.
But think of Jesus and how He lived. This is the way He wants us to live and the way He wants us to love. He laid down His life for all of us. Jesus saw needs-eternal needs. He wanted everyone to have life abundant. He saw a life and could see what it could be in Him.
...because He loves us...
Father in Heaven,
Forgive me for not looking for Your good in people. Forgive me for not seeing what people could be in You. Fill me with the desire to see Your good in all.
コメント