Love You LORD!

Scripture

I love YouLord, my strength.

~Psalms 18:1, NIV

Quote

I love the LORD Jesus and my greatest need is to love Him more.

~Adrian Rogers

Eugene Luther Bailey, US ARMY, WWII

My father was not much on verbal expressions of affection. I don’t think, I certainly don’t recall him every telling me that he loved me. I don’t think he told any of his children that he loved them. I did try to please him to some extent but I always did something wrong and whatever I did wrong would capture his attention. I can’t remember a single time when he praised me for anything. The strange thing about life is that you vow not to be like your parents and you end up being like your parents. I am not good at verbal expressions of affection. My grandkids don’t have a problem but I still struggle to get those three words, “I love you,” to the surface. Before daddy departed, a friend came to me with some encouraging words; he said, “Jack, your daddy loved you but his generation didn’t know how to put that in words.” Looking back, I have no doubt that daddy loved me. As a matter of fact, and I know this sounds weird, Daddy’s love for me is more real today than ever before. Let me ask you a question: when did you last tell the LORD that you loved Him? Hey, He already knows our heart so is there any need to tell Him we love Him? What holds us back? What keeps us from expressing our love to the LORD?

I think it is our sin and guilt. If you remember, Peter was reluctant to tell Jesus that he loved Him but this came after Peter’s infamous fall. At one time Peter had bragged about his love for Jesus. Peter even thought that he was an example, a good one. He was wishing everyone loved Jesus like he did but then he denied Christ and it shattered his confidence. In the end Peter acknowledges that he loves Christ but not to the degree that Christ loved him. He refuses to use the strongest word in the Greek language for love: he used instead a word that refers to the love of a friend. So I guess the place for you and I to start is with an honest confession. Our love for Jesus is not perfect and it certainly is not of the same quality as His love for us, but we do love Him and it would not hurt us to say it. I guess Dr. Rogers was following logic of the father who came to Jesus with his son. The father expressed some doubt in Jesus ability and Jesus called him on it. The man’s response was, “I believe but please help my unbelief.” So we can all pray the Adrian Rogers prayer, “I love You LORD, but I need and want to love You more.”

Checked in on Terry Cole last night. He over did it on the exercise yesterday and was a bit exhausted but other than that, doing good. I will be leaving momentarily to check on Lou and our other shut-ins.

I am dreading this cold weather that they say is coming but I am enjoying the sunshine we have today. Have a great day. Thank you for reading the blog. Pray for your PASTOR and PRESIDENT. Pray for God to anoint your pastor with Spirit of Holiness. Pray that the holy fire of heaven will fall on this service in the morning. Remember: all is vain unless the Spirit of the Holy One comes down. Will you pray with all your power as your pastor preaches the word.

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