Baptism Quote

for you Jesus Christ came into the world
for you he lived and showed God's love
for you he suffered death on the Cross
for you he triumphed over death
rising to newness of life
for you he prays at God's right hand
     all this for you
     before you could know anything of it
In your baptism
the word of scripture is fulfilled:
"We love, because God first loved us."

Methodist Worship Book, UK, 1999

I really like how it presents baptism as an act of our love for God only in the overwhelming context of God's prior love for us.  But part of me wants to insert somewhere: "but not just for you."

I love U

That was the custom number plate on a car that was dawdling in the middle lane of the motorway this morning. As I approached I was feeling mildly irritated by the dawdling but couldn't help but smile when I read the plate. I know I wasn't the object of that sentence but at the same time just reading those words cheered me up. As I passed the car I saw it was being driven by a middle aged lady, who obviously aware that having such a number plate meant many inquiring looks from other motorists, kept her eyes trained dead ahead. In that brief moment I thought of how how the person who gave her that number plate must have loved her. Then, after returning my eyes to the road ahead, I thought about how much she must love him (?) to actually drive around with that plate on her car. The number plate was both an embarrassingly public declaration of love, but also a very public acceptance of that love.

It gave me a warm glow at the time.

Love needs to be public. Somehow a love that we keep to ourselves and hide away from others is not really complete. The public declaration of an internal feeling lends it a substance and reality that it lacks when only a secret. Not only that, but when public that love can benefit others around who witness it. God's love for us was made public in the cross of Christ (1 John 3:16) and continues to be made public when those who God loves take up their own crosses, discipleship. When we live according to the radical demands of the gospel it is not a burden but a gift (1 John 5:3). we don't live in denial of ourselves to show how much we can love, but to show how much we are loved by God and our acceptance of that love. Just like that lady's number plate showed first that she was loved, and only then that she loved back, our lives should show that "We love because God first loved us." (1 John 4:19)

God, Worship, and Love: thoughts on 1 John 4:7-12

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No-one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. (1 John 4:7-12)

I must confess, I am becoming more and more frustrated with the songs we sing in church and the songs I hear on Christian radio. Far too many of them focus on our love for God. There is nothing wrong with telling God we love God, or expressing our feelings of gratitude, or even expressing how we want to feel towards God (despite the reality of our cold hearts). But it is depressing all the same. My love for God is pathetic, of mixed motives, and constantly wavering. God's love for me is unlimited, pure, and never failing. Which would you rather focus on? Instead of singing to God "I love you" it is much more amazing to sing "you love me!"

This God of love is manifested as we love each other. Another confession, I would feel awkward to sing songs of love to the rest of my church family. But that is no reason not to do it. This passage of scripture asks us to respond to God's love, not with an introverted spiritual activity where we experience an intimate and loving moment with God "I love you, you love me", but by loving each other "you (God) love me, so I love your people". It is this outward loving (towards each other) rather than the 'upward' love (towards God only) that actually sees the transcendent God living among us completely. We love God as we live through Christ by loving each other. Experiences of Spiritual intimacy are not wrong, in fact they can be wonderful, but neither are they complete experiences of God's love.

Anyone know any songs that combine "God loves me" with "we love each other"?