MAY 7, 2023

"Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy."  

― Kahlil Gibran

1 KINGS 14-15

11Asa did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, as his father David had done. 12He expelled the male shrine prostitutes from the land and got rid of all the idols his ancestors had made. 13He even deposed his grandmother Maakah from her position as queen mother, because she had made a repulsive image for the worship of Asherah. Asa cut it down and burned it in the Kidron Valley. 14Although he did not remove the high places, Asa’s heart was fully committed to the Lord all his life. 15He brought into the temple of the Lord the silver and gold and the articles that he and his father had dedicated.

JOHN 1:1-28

 9The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.14The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. 

JOURNAL

Jesus himself was rejected by the very world that he created.  He was ridiculed, spit on, betrayed, wrongly accused, whipped and crucified. This was how the world embraced it's creator...Yet Jesus accepted it...he absorbed all the hate, rage, jealousy, fear and anger. He did it so that we could understand and receive God's love...the love he possessed.

I think about this in terms of how I have lived most of my life looking for achievement and acceptance. I want my work and my efforts to be acknowledged, I want to know that I matter. Yet when I look at the life of Christ I see an entirely different motivation. He operated out of love for us, not to gain it, but rather to give it. He endured all adversity, not for trophies or riches or championships, rather he endured it because he loved us and wanted us to have what he possessed. 

In doing so, he paved a path that allows us to follow. In following he promises that we will receive his spirit, that we will know the joy of living a life of love, the joy of giving our best even when it's rejected. We are promised that when we follow him and surrender our best then we have already won. Living, working and all our labor become our joy not our desperation to achieve. Giving everything I have no longer empties me...paradoxically it fulfills me. 

"Whatever you do, work at it with your whole being, for the Lord and not for men..." 

COLOSSIANS 3:23