Life of Pride
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
So I'm smart. So what?
"Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing."
We are in this world to love and serve, not to know. The greatest commandment, which encompasses all the rest, is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, body, and strength - and our neighbor as ourself.
How could I have missed this for so long? For years I prayed daily for wisdom. Not until a few months ago did I realize how incomplete that prayer was by itself. Love is the answer. It carries with it all the rest.
Sometimes it doesn't matter who is right. Sometimes love decrees service through silence.
"Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing."
We are in this world to love and serve, not to know. The greatest commandment, which encompasses all the rest, is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, body, and strength - and our neighbor as ourself.
How could I have missed this for so long? For years I prayed daily for wisdom. Not until a few months ago did I realize how incomplete that prayer was by itself. Love is the answer. It carries with it all the rest.
Sometimes it doesn't matter who is right. Sometimes love decrees service through silence.
Comments:
Perhaps your prayer for wisdom has been answered. If understanding what the most important thing in life is isn't wisdom, what is? :)
And perhaps knowing, really knowing, is not so far from love.
And perhaps knowing, really knowing, is not so far from love.
The thing is, guys, true love includes all those other elements as well. It's not an emotional, fuzzy state, but a righteous act of the will. :)
The thing is, guys, true love includes all those other elements as well. It's not an emotional, fuzzy state, but a righteous act of the will. :)
The thing is, guys, true love includes all those other elements as well. It's not an emotional, fuzzy state, but a righteous act of the will. :)
To clarify...
true love includes all those other elements as well. It's not an emotional, fuzzy state, but a righteous act of the will.
I think it would be more accurate (and possibly what you meant) to say that true love is not always an emotional, fuzzy state, nor it it always a righteous act of the will, but rather, a combination of the two, both falling back on each other.
Yes, you can argue that my position on this is skewed because of my recent engagement, well, there is not much I can do about that. :-)
At any rate, I think a very good way for the mature Christian to better understand true love is to look at our relationship with Christ, especially if it has had time to progress - there are times of fuzzy feeling, and times of nothing but pure willpower, yet through both, the relationship stays it's course. And that says nothing of how Christ shows His love to us...
true love includes all those other elements as well. It's not an emotional, fuzzy state, but a righteous act of the will.
I think it would be more accurate (and possibly what you meant) to say that true love is not always an emotional, fuzzy state, nor it it always a righteous act of the will, but rather, a combination of the two, both falling back on each other.
Yes, you can argue that my position on this is skewed because of my recent engagement, well, there is not much I can do about that. :-)
At any rate, I think a very good way for the mature Christian to better understand true love is to look at our relationship with Christ, especially if it has had time to progress - there are times of fuzzy feeling, and times of nothing but pure willpower, yet through both, the relationship stays it's course. And that says nothing of how Christ shows His love to us...
# posted by 
: 11:05 PM
: 11:05 PM
... where, time and time again in the Bible, it expresses His love for us using both intense feeling and emotion as well as a pure determination of will.
# posted by : 11:08 PM
: 11:08 PM
Nate - to ask the flip side:
Can wisdom, honesty, justice, mercy, selflessness, or generosity be there without a measure of love?
I think the answer is pretty clearly no - in other words, they are mutually inclusive - you cannot truly be selfless without being loving, nor can you be truly loving without being selfless, and so on with all the rest.
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Can wisdom, honesty, justice, mercy, selflessness, or generosity be there without a measure of love?
I think the answer is pretty clearly no - in other words, they are mutually inclusive - you cannot truly be selfless without being loving, nor can you be truly loving without being selfless, and so on with all the rest.
# posted by : 11:24 PM
: 11:24 PM