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Tuesday, August 15, 2017

Test Yourself – Is There Love?

{2 Corinthians 13}

By Lisa Thayer

Last week I had the privilege of attending a 2-day retreat for high school seniors.  I was a small group facilitator – I made sure these kids stayed together and participated in the events.  The speaker was amazing.  His life story was uplifting and encouraging and his message really pointed to unity.  To be unified with Christ.

Here in this final chapter to the Corinthians, Paul knew he was dealing with on-going problems in the Church.  These seniors at this retreat, were a tough group to engage, and Paul – the speaker, could have given up and refused to communicate with them, but he continued to speak the truth to these kids.  He never gave up.  He never stopped loving this group of dead-eyed, high school seniors.  He never stopped encouraging them and building them up.

As believers, we have to reach out to people who are sinning, but we have to do it in such a way that truly is with the love of Christ.  We don’t want to break relationships – but build them up.  We want to heal people.  We can blast people away with laws and rules, or we could turn from these people because we don’t want to face their situation.  We can isolate them by gossiping about their problem and turn others against them.  Or like both Paul’s, we can seek to build relationships by taking a better approach – sharing, communicating and caring. 


“For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth.”  2 Corinthians 13:8



I am reminded that there were different churches back in the days of the early church – the Corinthian church, the Galatian church, the church at Ephesus and the church in Rome, just to name a few.  We can get wrapped up in which church is better, whether Catholic, Methodist, Baptist, Christian Reformed, etc., and push people away because of the rules established in each of these named faiths by being insistent on following the rules.  We can lose our focus of the One truth – that Christ is our Savior.  That failing to believe in Him is the greatest sin.  We owe our entire lives to Him.  Each one of the original churches had people, not the entire church body, sinning.  BUT, each one also had believers.  Each one had people totally focused on the love of God and were willing to share that message with others.  I cannot help but look at how the apostle Paul went to Corinth, Ephesus, Philippi, Rome, Jerusalem, Thessalonica, Colossae, Antioch and others – these were all different people groups, yet Paul’s message was the same.  He risked his life to share it with so many people.  Are you?  Are you willing to help people from another background, a different faith, to share your love of Christ?

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