Leawood, Kansas, United States - The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection Daily Guide grow. pray. study. for Saturday, 18 October 2014 "The greatest of these is love"

Leawood, Kansas, United States - The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection Daily Guide grow. pray. study. for Saturday, 18 October 2014 "The greatest of these is love"
Daily Scripture: 1 Corinthians 6:16-20 There’s more to sex than mere skin on skin. Sex is as much spiritual mystery as physical fact. As written in Scripture, “The two become one.” Since we want to become spiritually one with the Master, we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever—the kind of sex that can never “become one.” There is a sense in which sexual sins are different from all others. In sexual sin we violate the sacredness of our own bodies, these bodies that were made for God-given and God-modeled love, for “becoming one” with another. Or didn’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit? Don’t you see that you can’t live however you please, squandering what God paid such a high price for? The physical part of you is not some piece of property belonging to the spiritual part of you. God owns the whole works. So let people see God in and through your body.
12:27-31 You are Christ’s body—that’s who you are! You must never forget this. Only as you accept your part of that body does your “part” mean anything. You’re familiar with some of the parts that God has formed in his church, which is his “body”:
apostles
prophets
teachers
miracle workers
healers
helpers
organizers
those who pray in tongues.
But it’s obvious by now, isn’t it, that Christ’s church is a complete Body and not a gigantic, unidimensional Part? It’s not all Apostle, not all Prophet, not all Miracle Worker, not all Healer, not all Prayer in Tongues, not all Interpreter of Tongues. And yet some of you keep competing for so-called “important” parts.
But now I want to lay out a far better way for you.
The Way of Love
13:1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.
2 If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.
3-7 If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.
8-10 Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.
11 When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.
12 We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!
13 But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.
Reflection Question:
Even though Paul spent eighteen months in Corinth, the Christians there had many struggles to grow beyond the self-serving, immoral culture that surrounded them. In a later letter to these Christians, Paul warned against the sexual immorality of their city. And, aware that they were dividing into factions striving for superiority, he penned his profound picture of what unselfish, enduring, God-sourced love looks like.
Many first-world Christians, like many first-century Greeks, prefer a "head" oriented faith, which coolly analyzes religious ideas and avoids emotional expressions. Yet in 1 Corinthians 13, Paul called love "an even better way" [than relating solely through our strongest abilities]. Without love, he said, being able to "know all the mysteries and everything else" lacks eternal value. What makes God-given love "the greatest of these"—greater even than hope and faith? What does it mean for you to love God "with ALL your heart, with ALL your being, with ALL your strength, and with ALL your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10:27)?
Family Activity:
Sometimes people in churches hurt one another. It is important to ask forgiveness when we sin against someone. As a family, take a handful of coins in a container to a nearby fountain. Ask each person to take one or more coins. Explain that this is a time to tell God "I'm sorry" for any sins committed. Ask each person to individually pray (aloud or silently) "Lord, I am sorry I…" and confess his or her sins to God. Then toss the coins into the water. Invite family members to dip their hands in the fountain for a quick washing. Finish by praying, "Thank you, God, for the gift of your forgiveness through Jesus Christ. Amen." Make sure to also ask the ones who were hurt by your words or actions for forgiveness.
Today's Prayer:
King Jesus, I want to love as you love, but every day I fall short of that ideal. But every day your love surrounds me, and I trust it to help me keep growing toward the kind of love you call me to live. Amen.

Insight from Liz Gyori

Liz Gyori serves on the Resurrection staff as the Group Life Training Program Director.

Odds are good that if you’ve ever attended a church wedding ceremony, you’ve heard at least part of 1 Corinthians 13. In fact, if you were at my wedding in Chicago 24 years ago, you heard my sister read it. My husband and I were nominally religious back then, and when our pastor asked us what scriptures we wanted to use in our service, we gave her blank stares in response. Sighing, she pulled out her Bible and said, “How about 1 Corinthians 13? It’s not really about romantic love, but a lot of people like to include it.” She read it to us, and in our mutual pre-wedding fog, we thought it was perfect, not bothering to pursue her comment any further.

I am still crazy about my husband, and I’m pretty sure he loves me, too. We really do strive to put the other first, and, truly, we have ‘put up’ with a lot of things from each other in our 24 married years. But we fall short of this kind of perfect love, this Godly love, all the time. Ask our kids. They have some good stories.

Fortunately, we are surrounded by people in our Resurrection community who consistently demonstrate the characteristics of love as Paul describes them. Here is just one recent example: A good friend’s son died tragically while she was out of town, and two of her longtime small group members made sure they were at the airport to meet her as she arrived home. That was a kind and loving act, made more remarkable because they hadn’t been able to get her flight information. They made some educated guesses and met every potential flight that day, until they connected with her. Now that is patience. While they were at the airport, others in her church family cleaned her home, stocked her kitchen with food, and prayed for her. Months later, those women continue to surround my friend with this kind of love.

Demonstrations of true, Christian love occur every day within our church community, but of course there are many examples outside of Resurrection as well. Perhaps you’re familiar with the story of the father and son pair, Dick and Rick Hoyt. In 1962, Rick was born with cerebral palsy. His parents were advised to institutionalize him, but they refused. At home, they soon realized that although Rick couldn’t walk or speak, he was very bright. They fought to integrate him into school, and included him in family physical activities like swimming and sledding. Eventually, Rick was able to communicate, using a head piece to tap out messages on a computer. In 1977, he told his father that he wanted to participate in a 5-mile benefit run. His father, who wasn’t a runner, agreed to push Rick in his wheelchair. They came in next to last, but that night, Rick told his father that when they were running, it felt like he wasn’t handicapped. That was all his father needed to hear. Team Hoyt was born.*

The two completed over 1000 races together, including 6 Ironman competitions. (In a triathlon,Rick’s dad would pull him in a boat with a bungee cord attached to a vest around his waist). Dick is now in his mid-70’s, and the pair completed their final Boston marathon this past April. When I watch a video of the two of them competing, I feel like I am seeing the personification of Paul’s words: “Love puts up with all things, trusts in all things, hopes for all things, endures all things. Love never fails.” Watch the video below and see if you feel the same way.

<iframe src="//player.vimeo.com/video/25296454" width="500" height="372" frameborder="0" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen></iframe>

Imagine-Because you CAN (Team Hoyt) from Bo Bernal on Vimeo.

____________________________