Today's Inspiration by Dream Team Member Shelley Brandon
John 14:9-17
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.
Romans 7:14-25
14 We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. 15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.[c] For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
21 So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature[d] a slave to the law of sin.
Today’s song is another Josh Groban tune called “Higher Window”. Like yesterday, I’m renaming the song “Paul’s Song”
The two scripture passages may not appear to go together but for me they do. Jesus is telling his disciples in John that we are to love one another. When we love one another, when we love each other enough to share our Savior with them our joy is certain, it is promised. When we love each other and serve each other we reach beyond our human tendency to focus on ourselves.
When I’m working on a particularly detailed yarn project my eyes focus solely on the work in my hands. They are so absorbed in the tiny details in my hands that when I look up everything else around me is blurry. We do this on a spiritual level as well, focus on our own lives, our own issues so intently and completely that when we look outside ourselves the rest of the world is blurry. Jesus is telling us to focus outside our own bodies and love the ones God has placed in our lives.
Now I will attempt to tie this all together. Paul was so focused on persecuting that he missed Jesus altogether. He didn’t love; his heart was full of hatred. Christ removed Paul’s eyesight so that Paul might see. Even after his encounter with the living Christ, Paul struggled with his humanity. “15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” He did however love. Paul loved Jesus so much that he found joy in the worst of circumstances in order to teach the world around him about his Savior.
Now as to the song; I can picture Paul after his blinding experience in the presence of Jesus. On his knees, asking what Jesus wanted him to do and pleading, “Don’t tell me it’s too late to love you!” How many times have those words echoed from lost souls throughout history. On our knees before the Lord, broken, lost, alone and desperate, “Please Jesus, don’t tell me it’s too late to love you!”
Most Holy God, we give you thanks for the Light from a Higher Window… your love shining down on us. Help us to share your light with everyone we meet. Help us to keep your love in us shining and visible as a living testimony to your truth. Keep us ever mindful of what we ought to be doing to help us remember that you have freed us from bondage with the gift of your son. In Jesus’ name… Amen.
John 14:9-17
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.
Romans 7:14-25
14 We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. 15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.[c] For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
21 So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature[d] a slave to the law of sin.
Today’s song is another Josh Groban tune called “Higher Window”. Like yesterday, I’m renaming the song “Paul’s Song”
The two scripture passages may not appear to go together but for me they do. Jesus is telling his disciples in John that we are to love one another. When we love one another, when we love each other enough to share our Savior with them our joy is certain, it is promised. When we love each other and serve each other we reach beyond our human tendency to focus on ourselves.
When I’m working on a particularly detailed yarn project my eyes focus solely on the work in my hands. They are so absorbed in the tiny details in my hands that when I look up everything else around me is blurry. We do this on a spiritual level as well, focus on our own lives, our own issues so intently and completely that when we look outside ourselves the rest of the world is blurry. Jesus is telling us to focus outside our own bodies and love the ones God has placed in our lives.
Now I will attempt to tie this all together. Paul was so focused on persecuting that he missed Jesus altogether. He didn’t love; his heart was full of hatred. Christ removed Paul’s eyesight so that Paul might see. Even after his encounter with the living Christ, Paul struggled with his humanity. “15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” He did however love. Paul loved Jesus so much that he found joy in the worst of circumstances in order to teach the world around him about his Savior.
Now as to the song; I can picture Paul after his blinding experience in the presence of Jesus. On his knees, asking what Jesus wanted him to do and pleading, “Don’t tell me it’s too late to love you!” How many times have those words echoed from lost souls throughout history. On our knees before the Lord, broken, lost, alone and desperate, “Please Jesus, don’t tell me it’s too late to love you!”
Most Holy God, we give you thanks for the Light from a Higher Window… your love shining down on us. Help us to share your light with everyone we meet. Help us to keep your love in us shining and visible as a living testimony to your truth. Keep us ever mindful of what we ought to be doing to help us remember that you have freed us from bondage with the gift of your son. In Jesus’ name… Amen.
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