Posts with the category “first-comes-love”

Highlight If yesterday’s chapter 4 was the opening statement of judgment - today’s chapter 11 is the moment of hope and unconditional love. God has been revisiting Israel's history and calling out their sin for what it is. But here in chapter 11 we find Him personally stepping into the story of grieving over His children and their waywardness. God proclaims His divine grace and covenant love over His people. In the midst of judgment and accountability, the loving parent - God the Father - provides hope and a salvation plan.  Read More

Highlight Chapter 4 is Hosea’s prophetic message from God to Israel. It is a full judgment speech of the way God’s people have broken their covenant. The three major ways He brings to light are their lack of faithfulness, lack of kindness, and lack of knowledge in God. They have not been faithful to God, worshiping other gods and making idols. Yet, He has been faithful to them. There is a lack of truth-telling and truth-doing in all the land.. Kindness cannot be found among the people. It is “every man for himself” which is not the way God portrays His steadfast love. Then there is a deep lack of any knowledge of God. The Israelites do not have a personal relationship with God, they do not care to know Him. In the absence of not knowing Him, they have been led astray by the other nations around them. This message from God seems depressing and hopeless. Thankfully it is only a piece of a longer message.   Read More

Highlight Love is an action. Love is costly. Verse 1 God commands Hosea to “go, show love to your wife” and immediately he “bought her for…” (v. 2). It is not meant in a demeaning way, it is a literal action of his wife caught up in adultery and prostitution for him to have to “buy her out.” But he does, not just because God commanded, but because God had transformed his understanding of forgiveness and love. Hosea understood that love must go above and beyond for the other person, and that boundaries are needed. While Hosea purchases and loves his wife, he also restores their marriage by setting boundaries; “You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you (v. 3).” Both love and boundaries are foundational for relationships.  Read More

Highlight Salvation and restoration is coming. Both for Gomer from Hosea and the Israelites from God. God declares five of His own characteristics that He promises to lavish on His people. They are righteousness, justice, love, compassion and faithfulness. Only God can fulfill these attributes. He is the only one who can bring salvation to His people through righteousness, justice, love, compassion and faithfulness. Yet, He calls us to live out these attributes too. Especially if we have accepted His gift of salvation, not because we are attempting to earn His gift. But because of His great love for us, why would we not share with others the righteousness, justice, love, compassion, and faithfulness He has shown us? What better way to bring others into the loving fold of God’s family but displaying the same attributes He bestows onto us.  Read More

Highlight It is important to know the style in which an author wrote the original book or letter. Often it is not the simple autobiography or history or nonfiction, we might think of and read today. In fact, when reading the Bible it is even more important to consider the style and audience. The Bible consists of many different literature styles, and many different styles in one book. For example, Hosea could come across as an allegory or metaphor. But in fact, it is the actual experience of Hosea and the prophetic message God shares with him. While pieces of Hosea’s story have a deeper meaning and symbolism interwoven. The overall story is fully Hosea’s experience with God, his wife, children and the people of Israel. It is not likely anyone would make up the experiences Hosea encountered.  Read More

Welcome to Week 6 of the First Comes Love Reading Plan! This reading plan is designed to partner with Compassion Christian Church’s sermon series of the same name, which you can find information about right here.  Read More

Highlight The definition of “simple one” in verse 7 is “a youth who lacked judgment,” “a youth lacking of heart,” or “one devoid of common sense or understanding.” No one wants to be described that way. But the narrator of this proverb describes anyone who falls into the temptation of adultery as a “simple one” - easily taken in. Only thinking of themselves and the current pleasure, not thinking about the fact that “it will cost him his life” (v. 23).  Read More

Highlight Being confronted with the truth often hurts. It causes anger, bitterness, denial, and sometimes resentment towards the person who called your bluff. David could have gone through all of those emotions when Nathan confronted him about the sins he had committed. Yet, he knew he was guilty and sincerely regretful. David wrote Psalm 51 as an expression of his vulnerability and deepest sincerity of his own guilt and remorse, but also of God’s forgiveness, love and kindness.  Read More

Highlight David and Bathsheba. A story that begins to send David’s life into a different direction. Up to this point, David has followed God’s laws and seems to live a life of integrity before God. Yet, one decision begins to spiral and leads him deeper and deeper into sin.  Read More

ighlight Jesus laid out the plan of church discipline, which we see Paul reiterating here in his letter. Discipline can get mixed reviews but it must be addressed. Not in a harsh or belittling way, but in a careful, straightforward and loving manner.  Read More

Highlight Paul makes it clear that the situation of “a man sleeping with his father’s wife” is a sin and even something pagans do not do (v. 1). Yet, that was not Paul’s intention behind this portion of the letter. His larger intention was to call out and remind the church that they are called to a higher standard in Christ. While he makes it clear we are not to judge those who are outside the church (v. 12). He grew angry at the Corinthians for not casting out “the old yeast” and not “expelling the wicked person from amongst you (v. 7-8)”. Christ came as the Passover Lamb for us to be cleaned and walk in His truth (v. 8). Not for us to take grace for granted.  Read More

Welcome to Week 5 of the First Comes Love Reading Plan! This reading plan is designed to partner with Compassion Christian Church’s sermon series of the same name, which you can find information about right here.  Read More

Highlight In this final poem we see the summary and conclusion of our epic love story. Eros love is mysterious in many ways. In the context of marriage, in its unadulterated form, it’s pure bliss. However, the Song ends with a reminder about the power and intensity of love and a warning that it can be both beautiful and destructive. And yet God chooses to offer it to us for our good, to help quench a piece of our human longing to know and be known…and perhaps simply for our pleasure because part of His very nature is joy and delight. To know our spouse in this intimate, transformative way is also to know Him more.  Read More

Highlight Our lovers have finally united and their passion is unhindered. Twice leading up to these chapters we hear the Young Woman ask her friends to help her ‘not to awaken love until the time is right’ (2:7 & 3:5). It’s implied that in the early chapters of the book that our young couple is betrothed, but not married. Their anticipation is palpable…we’ve all been there. The Young Woman’s concern is not about the goodness of love and sex itself, but her sincere desire to receive this gift from God in the way she knows it can be fully enjoyed as He intended, in the context of marriage. Safe in the protection of this sacred union her heart is set free.  Read More

Highlight It may seem out of place to find such sultry language in the Bible, and it begs the question ‘why?’ Why would God include a book of passionate love poems in His Word to us? Well, there are a few traditional answers to that question. The Jewish tradition was that the Song of Solomon was an allegory representing Israel as the woman and God as the man, with their love as a symbol of the covenant between God and his people. After the time of Christ, many Christians interpreted it similarly as an allegory of the love of Christ for his Church, and we see similar language used by Paul in Ephesians 5:25-33. But it’s also possible that it is simply exactly how it reads, beautiful poetry celebrating the gift of Eros love given by God to be enjoyed in marriage.  Read More

Since this is a book of poetry, the author is not held to a linear plot line. However, there are several interesting themes that weave their way throughout the work. Clearly the intense desire of these lovers and the joy they find in their passion for one another is a primary theme. However, you may also notice that there is quite a bit of garden imagery used throughout the book as well. Some scholars believe it’s possible that the author is using this imagery to connect us to the Garden of Eden - where the Eros love between man and woman was first created and called good by God and where Adam and Eve were ‘naked and felt no shame’ (Gen. 2:24-25). Here we are painted a beautiful picture of unrestrained love in its purest form, untainted by selfishness and sin.  Read More

Highlight This week we’re learning about the ‘Eros’ form of love described in Scripture. Eros is a Greek word from which we derive the word ‘erotic’. In Scripture, it describes the passionate, physical expression of sexual love between a husband and wife. What better place to explore ‘eros’ than the Song of Solomon? We’re going to work our way through this steamy book of Jewish love poetry throughout this week, so buckle up and stay cool.   Read More

Welcome to Week 4 of the First Comes Love Reading Plan! This reading plan is designed to partner with Compassion Christian Church’s sermon series of the same name, which you can find information about right here. We all start with innocent notions of love that our world can quickly shatter; turns out relationships are more complicated than a nursery rhyme! In the First Comes Love series we’re going to examine the biblical understanding of love by focusing on topics like friendship, singleness, loneliness, marriage, sex and family. In this reading plan, we will spend time in stories and teachings that will deepen our own understanding of the Bible’s instruction in these areas.  Read More

Highlight In this final chapter of Paul’s letter we get a glimpse into the pain of relational desertion he has endured. Paul, like Jesus, in his final days is abandoned by many of those who followed and served with him. His loneliness is evident as he asks for Timothy to come and be with him. And yet, Paul is quick to note that he is not truly alone and has not lost sight of his purpose, even in a prison cell: “But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it” (v. 17). Whatever our relationship status may be, we can all identify with Paul because we’ve all lived through seasons of loneliness. We’ve felt abandoned, betrayed and unloved, sometimes by the people we trusted most. But this is the hope of every follower of Christ. In the pain of this life we are never really alone. And if we remain faithful as Paul did to the race set before us, at the end of this life we will cross the finish line and walk through the gates of heaven where all brokenness is restored and we can enjoy unhindered union with the Lord who rescued us and was faithful to us…always.  Read More

Highlight A clear mark of whether the transformative work of the Spirit is evident in someone’s life is how they show up in their relationships with others. Paul paints a pretty grim picture of what becomes of those who love themselves more than God and others. The truth is we’ve all experienced this. The working out of our relationships is often like holding a mirror up to what is in our hearts, and that’s not always pretty. And even if we choose to follow Jesus we still have to contend with the broken people around us. In fact, Paul doesn’t say that followers of Jesus will be insulated from the pain of broken and damaging relationships, it’s the opposite in fact, we should expect persecution from those for whom the Gospel is an affront to their self-centeredness. But there is hope! Through the truth of God’s word and the power of the Holy Spirit we can not only endure, but we can become people of love and peace whose transformed presence is a balm to the relational brokenness of our world.  Read More

Highlight Pauls sees Timothy as a spiritual son and here he is teaching Timothy how to lead the spiritual family that’s been entrusted to him. This is no easy task. The church in Ephesus has been corrupted by false teachers who are leading the people of God astray. But Paul reminds Timothy that the circumstances and relationships of this world are fleeting and encourages him to keep his eye on the prize of eternity and not to get distracted by unhealthy relational conflict. Timothy is instructed to stay focused and remain full of grace, even for members of the family that are difficult to love.   Read More

Highlight This week we’re exploring what God has to say about singleness. Truthfully, there is not a lot in Scripture that directly addresses singleness, but as we saw yesterday what is shared is overwhelmingly positive because of the freedom it affords to followers of Jesus to focus fully on God’s Kingdom and to embrace the family of God, his Church, in a special way. We’re going to spend the rest of this week in 2 Timothy which is Paul's pastoral letter to his disciple whom he is preparing to continue His mission work. Paul is writing this message from prison, and while this is certainly not the first time he’s been put in prison for sharing the Gospel, he feels this may be his last - Paul knows it’s likely he will not survive. Paul, who was never married and has now been abandoned by many of his followers and friends because of the shame and fear associated with his imprisonment, is celebrating the Spirit’s work in his life which has given him the strength to stand for Christ even when he has had to do so alone, and is encouraging Timothy to do the same.  Read More

Highlight In the American Church today marriage is often the assumed and perhaps even elevated status of relationship for believers. However, it’s clear in this passage from Paul’s letter to the Corinthian church that this was not his view. In his article, Single in a Church of Families, writer Ryan Griffith explains “The church’s countercultural commitment to building healthy marriages and families can sometimes reinforce an inaccurate picture of the nuclear family as the ultimate goal and final state for faithful Christians. Singleness can also be perceived as inferior and unenviable — or worse, disobedient or disqualifying. It is striking, then, that John the Baptist, Jesus, and the apostle Paul — all unmarried themselves — view singleness as a legitimate and positive vocation. Jesus and Paul argue that singleness, while uncommon (1 Corinthians 7:9; 1 Timothy 4:1–3), is a gift bestowed by God (Matthew 19:12; 1 Corinthians 7:7). While marriage remains the norm for most, the New Testament, in contrast with the Old, has an overwhelmingly positive view of singleness”.  Read More

We all start with innocent notions of love that our world can quickly shatter; turns out relationships are more complicated than a nursery rhyme! In the First Comes Love series we’re going to examine the biblical understanding of love by focusing on topics like friendship, singleness, loneliness, marriage, sex and family. In this reading plan, we will spend time in stories and teachings that will deepen our own understanding of the Bible’s instruction in these areas.  Read More

Highlight This week we’ve been reading Paul’s writings to the churches in Ephesus and Crete with instructions on how we should love one another the way Jesus has loved us. On our final day of this week, we are shifting our focus to a letter from Peter. Peter was a disciple of Jesus who was commissioned by Jesus himself to lead the first church (Matthew 16:16-20). Eventually Peter’s ministry expands, and 1 Peter is a letter commissioned by Peter from Rome to be circulated among the churches in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey). The believers in Asia Minor were not Jewish, but they were suffering similar persecution at the hands of the Roman Empire in their region.  Read More

Highlight Titus is a Greek follower of Jesus that became a student and co-worker of Paul’s on his missionary travels. In this letter, Paul is writing to Titus who he has sent to work with a network of house churches in Crete, an island off the coast of Greece. Crete is home to a large port which Paul chooses strategically because there are so many people from around the known world who pass through and can be impacted by the Gospel and hopefully take it back to their places of origin. However, Crete’s unique, diverse and transient society also makes for some challenges in the church.  Read More

In chapter 6 Paul expands his encouragement to use our everyday relationships as a platform from which to display the love of Christ and the truth of the Gospel. After beginning with the example of how husbands and wives can love one another in such a way that it will point others to Christ, he adds opportunities in the relationships between parents & children and slave & master. Paul quotes from the Old Testament reminding the Ephesians of God’s instruction to honor their parents, but adds to this the expectation that parents love their children by teaching them how to follow and love the Lord. Here again, he is reflecting this picture of the Gospel where Jesus, who has all authority and power, chooses to love us with humility and self-sacrifice.  Read More

Highlight Now that Paul has given a broad picture of what it means to live as people of love by shining light on the love of Jesus, he begins to unpack examples of how this is lived out in our everyday relationships. These are commonly referred to as the ‘Household Codes’, and we’ll see these reappear as a teaching reiterated to other New Testament churches in our readings this week. Paul is helping the believers in Ephesus make their faith practical by explaining how loving and following Jesus should transform the way we love others.  Read More

Highlight The Apostle Paul wrote this letter to the church in Ephesus from prison. You can hear from the beginning of his letter the affection he has for the believers there. He planted this church on his second missionary journey (Acts 18:19) and over the course of his ministry spent years teaching and growing the Ephesian church. He spends the first part of the book writing beautifully about the love of God displayed in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus which makes possible a new Kingdom family. Ephesus is a unique testing ground for this radical shift to include Gentiles (non-Jews) in the family of God. It was once considered the most important trading center in the Mediterranean region, a bustling port city and center of trade as well as of Greco-Roman worship to false gods and idols from all over the region. You can still visit the well-preserved ruins of the ancient city of Ephesus today in modern-day Turkey.  Read More

Welcome to Week 2 of the First Comes Love Reading Plan! This reading plan is designed to partner with Compassion Christian Church’s sermon series of the same name, which you can find information about right here.  Read More

Highlight This passage is a perfect ending to a week of readings about love: “Above all things, put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” (v14) In Matthew 22, Jesus said the greatest of God’s commandments were to love Him and to love others. In John 15, Jesus gives a new commandment, to love one another the same way that He loved us. Over and over, Jesus emphasized the centrality of love for his followers and Paul’s teaching here agrees with that. In Colossians 3, Paul (like Jesus did) says that many things are important for a Christ follower yet one thing is of greatest importance: love. This harmonizes with his teachings in 1 Corinthians, declaring that we can do all of the other things that Jesus has called us to do but if we lack love then we are not actually following the example of Jesus nor will we glorify Him as we ought to.  Read More

Highlight The word for “love” throughout these verses is agape. Agape is a specific word for love that describes unconditional love. It’s an active, sacrificial, other-centered love. This is the love that reflects the love of God towards us. In English we have phrases like ‘falling in love,’ which implies that love is a feeling that happens to you. But God’s love is not something that happens to Him… It’s who He is. And in the teachings of Jesus about love, the emphasis is not on a feeling but on action. Agape is action oriented, a choice that we make to seek the well-being of others over our own well-being. That is how we were loved by Jesus and thus is how we ought to love others.   Read More

Highlight A key question that Paul is trying to answer in Romans 8 is how to process suffering as a Christian. As he closes the chapter, he beautifully connects the current and future confidence of a believer to the works of God in the past. The key verses are vv31-32, “If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” God has not given empty promises. To look on the cross is to be reminded that God gave his dearest to help the neediest. If He did that, then it naturally follows that the same gracious spirit will not withhold anything from those who are His. We can be assured of that now and forever.  Read More

Highlight The heart of this passage is the word remain/abide, which is used fifteen times in the first eleven verses. All spiritual power for living out the Christian life comes from God. There is only one way for a believer to receive this power: remaining in unbroken fellowship with the source of the power. In v7, Jesus puts an emphasis on his words abiding in us. To meditate on the words of Jesus is to be in communion with him. When we open ourselves to the words of Jesus, we discover that we experience a genuine encounter with Jesus himself.  Read More

Highlight This chapter is one of the most well-known passages in all of Scripture… and for good reason. Because this passage is so familiar, it’s a great opportunity to stop and reflect deeply on it. A simple way to do that is to take the most well known verses (vv 4-8) and replace the word “love” with two different names. First, read the verses and every time the verse says “love” replace it with your own name. Let Scripture convict and exhort you to be more loving. Second, replace the word “love” with the name “Jesus.” Let Scripture guide you in how to adore our Lord and Savior!  Read More

WELCOME Welcome to Week 01 of the First Comes Love Reading Plan. This reading plan is designed to partner with Compassion Christian Church’s sermon series of the same name, which you can find information about right here. We all start with innocent notions of love that our world can quickly shatter; turns out relationships are more complicated than a nursery rhyme In the First Comes Love series we’re going to examine the biblical understanding of love by focusing on topics like friendship, singleness, loneliness, marriage, sex and family. In this reading plan, we will spend time in stories and teachings that will deepen our own understanding of the Bible’s instruction in these areas.  Read More