Set an Example through Love!

Last week we discussed not letting anyone look down on us because of our youth. Instead, we are to be an example in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity (1 Timothy 4:12).

In the mid-week Bible study we focused on setting an example through love. Love is the one thing that should set Christians off from the rest of the world. It should be a mark that when people see it they say, "that person must be a Christian." Unfortunately, this is most often NOT how non-believers view Christians. Very often Christians are stereotyped as being judgmental, close-minded, and hypocritical. And honestly, there is probably some truth to that generalization.

Jesus made it very clear that love for God and love for people are the two most important things in the life of the believer (Mark 12:28-31). If we focused on obeying just those two commands all the other commands in the Bible would be obeyed. See, if we love people we would not steal from them, we would not murder them, we would not covet them, and we would not commit adultery against them. If we love God, we would not use his name in vain and we would not worship other gods. In fact, if we truly love God we would do whatever he told us to do (John 21:15).

So what does this kind of love look like? There are many places to look, 1 Corinthians 13, John 3:16, John 15:13 are all great verses to look at if you have time. However, I chose to look at 1 John 3 where it says this:
¹⁶ This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? ¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

There is no excuse for the Christians not to understand what love involves since we saw it clearly displayed in the one we claim to follow when he laid down his life for ours on the cross. Love is not simply a descriptive word to describe how we feel about something ("I love pizza", "I love the Redskins", "I love my wife") it involves action and it will most likely involve sacrifice. Not necessarily a sacrifice of your life (though that is not to be excluded) but a sacrifice of your desires, your priorities, your dreams, your comforts. Pretty much anything that can be labeled as "yours" because now the focus is not on "you", it is on God and others.

One final point about loving others that I think most people miss. Later on in 1 John 4, he makes the point that it is impossible to say that you love God, yet not love the people around you. See, how you treat and love others is a direct reflection on how much you really love God. Is it possible to love people and not love God? Yes. However, it is not possible to love God and not love the people around you. In fact, John says that anyone who makes that sort of claim is a liar. Ouch!

For me, that hits very close to home when I consider how I treat and often feel about other people. My challenge to you and to myself today is (1) to consider how much you love God and (2) consider how much you love the people around you. And remember, just saying that you love is not enough. It has to be evident. Think of it like this, if you were on trial for loving God and loving people; would you be convicted. Could the prosecution pull together enough witnesses and testimonies to convict you of loving God and loving people? I hope that they would.

The mark of the Christian is love, so set an example by demonstrating this love!

Let no one look down on your youth

In youth group, we just finished up a video series called "The Gospel Journey" by Dare to Share ministries. I highly recommend it if you haven't seen it. The gospel is clearly and creatively presented over several weeks. It also answers many questions that the average young person is wrestling with every day.

Since we finished that, I have been trying to figure out what to do next. Should I do another video series, speak topically on different issues, or go through a book in the Bible? Nothing was clearly standing out to me so last week I began talking about 1 Timothy 4:12. This verse says, "Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity, show yourself to be an example of those who believe". My plan was to use this verse to tide me over a week until I decided what to teach about. However, this verse has proven to be more interesting and full of exciting truth than I originally saw.

I asked the question, "Why do you think adults tend to look down on the youth?" Various answers included but were not limited to "because they are irresponsible", "because they are self-centered", "because we think we know it all", or "because we are apathetic". While these generalizations (and they are generalizations) are fairly true; I wonder if those assumptions are part of the problem? In other words, if that is the standard we are going to hold young people to, what reason do they have to try and overcome that? Our culture essentially tells teenagers that they are no longer kids but they are also not adults. The impression that most teens have is that since I am not an adult, why should I take responsibility for anything? I'm just going to have fun until I get to a certain age (whatever that may be), then I will take life seriously.

So my challenge last week was to raise the bar of expectations. Paul told Timothy (who was likely around 30ish) to not allow anyone to look down on him simply because he was young. The way people viewed Timothy should not be based on the cultures expectation of what a young person should be. Instead he was to be an example for all believers. I think it is interesting that Paul did not tell him to go out and tell all the older people to stop judging him. He wanted Timothy to show them this truth simply by the way that he lived his life. People are always going to judge us, but we have a say in how they do that. We can either live up to their expectations or we can rise above them. I say, based on this verse, rise above!!

Next week: In what ways can we set this example?

Why?

I have been debating for a couple of weeks about whether or not to start this blog. My biggest fear is that I won't be able to keep it up to date and it will fall away into irrelevancy.

My greatest hope in starting it is to be able to encourage and strengthen the faith of those who are able to spare the time to visit. I plan to post my lessons from Sunday School and the mid-week Bible study that I currently teach as Youth Pastor of Wye Bible Church.

I realized that many of those that are part of the Youth Group at WBC are not able to make it every week to either Tuesday or Sunday morning. Still others are unable to attend at all because they either go to a different youth group or are just too old to be in ours.

I hope that you make it a point to visit each week to see what we are talking about and feel free to comment what you think. Thanks!

Test Blog

This is a Test Blog. I am looking forward to see how it works. This the toolbox that used to be on my truck.