January 14, 2011

"Anyone who says he loves God but in fact hates his brother or sister is a liar. He doesn't love his brother or sister, whom he has seen. So he can't love God, whom he has not seen. Here is the command God has given us. Anyone who loves God must also love his brothers and sisters." 1 John 4:20-21, NIrV~

      How many times do we hear people saying that they believe in GOD and that they love GOD; but as soon as someone hurts their feelings they just slander the other person. Usually the choice of words is not the best when we feel hurt. Just like I mention before; our tongue can encourage someone or can hurt someone.  

     If we call ourselves Christians, we should be the first one showing love to others. Not just only to those we are sharing the word of GOD with but also with our Christian brothers and sisters. You may think is hard, and it is. Sometimes we encounter fellow Christians that the things they say and do makes us wonder about them. We must not judge, as fellow Christians we should pray because only GOD knows what that person is going through.

     This is something we also need to instruct our children on too. The siblings’ rivalry is a normal thing, who’s has not had a fight with a brother or sister. Usually we get over it. But these day kids can say the must hurtful things to each other. One thing that gets to me is when I hear my kids arguing about something completely insignificant (for me) and their last word to each other is “I hate you!”

     It break my heart, hate is such a harsh word. I told my kids that rather than say “I hate you!” how about say “I don’t like you!” or just like my grandmother use to say “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” I do believe that our everyday busyness and our stress about particular situations get to them too. They are learning from us about how to deal with frustration and sometimes we are not the best example for them.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: GOD love us no matter what; we love our children no matter what they say or do. So, why is so hard for us to love others like Christ love us? Why do we show a hateful attitude to those who hurt us? We may pray that GOD will change that person so we could love them. How about praying that GOD change YOU, so HE could use you to show others that hate is not an option.