Love Doesn't Envy

Hello Everyone,

Today we are going to think about something love doesn't do.  As I said earlier, love is an action verb.  The feeling of being in love is great but it's not the core of Love (God).

For this particular aspect of Love, it's interesting because it's something Love doesn't do.  Love doesn't envy someone else or something else they have.  This should be another easy one right?  Well in one sense that's true.  But let me encourage you to check yourself on this and see if there are any hidden areas of envy in your life.  I know I have found them in mine.

Let me give you a couple of examples.  I go to a gym and work out every day during the week.  I run in the morning before work and I lift weights with a little more cardio at lunch.  I'm in decent shape for 46 years old but the truth is I'm not as fast as I used to run and I'm 30 pounds overweight at the moment.  So what happens in the gym?  I can walk in and see someone working out who is in better shape than me.  Every once in a while, the devil will put a thought in my mind that says there is something I don't like about that person.  I don't like the way the act or how much they talk.  I don't like the way the hog up all the machines.  I don't like how long it takes them to get a set done and get out of my way.  Well here is what the Lord showed me about that one day.  What someone was doing or not wasn't the cause of my irritation.  What irritated me is that they were in better shape than me.  My envying of a person didn't come across as envy.  It came across as something else.

Let me tell on myself again.  I could be driving down the road and see someone speed past me or cut me off in traffic by getting into my lane and get upset with them.  This happened more times than not if the person was driving a really nice car.  I might even say under my breath something about how they think they are special or privileged, etc., because they were speeding or something else (which I have done myself on more than one occasion).  That seems logical right?  They should slow down and should be more careful in traffic.  But the truth behind what made me mad was they were driving a car and I was jealous of them because it looked like they had more money than me.

So what's the big deal with being jealous right?  After all, while I am not being loving toward either of those people, I am certainly not hurting them and neither of them knew I even had a thought?  Well, even if you don't say something hurtful to someone, this is still very damaging - TO ME.  Why?  Well, it blocks the flow of love out of my life and into someone else.  While that's bad enough, it also caused me to be unsatisfied with what I had.  Think about it.  Instead of enjoying the fact that I am in good health and the Lord has blessed us tremendously financially and every other way, I was unsatisfied and couldn't enjoy what I had.

So let me ask you this.  Are there any areas in your life where you might be secretly envious of someone else?  If so, I encourage you to get rid of it.  Envying is really dangerous to your health.

That's another Opinion of the Minion

Love is Kind

Hello Everyone,

Today's topic is love is kind.

OK this one should be a no brainer right?  We all know what it is to be kind.  My wife teaches kindergarten and she teaches her kids everyday to be kind to each other.  If I asked some of her five year old children to define kindness, they could.  The would tell me that kindness is being nice to a friend or kindness is sharing your blocks with another kid.  They might say kindness is letting someone get in line in front of you.

They would be right about those being acts of kindness and acts of love.  Notice again that this is an action.  It's not a feeling.  When we are kind to people, it makes us feel good but the kindness itself isn't a feeling.  Already we know that love is an act of the will because kindness is an act of our will.  We make a decision to do something kind for someone else.  As a matter of fact, I am plotting an act of kindness right now and it feels good.  I am really going to enjoy myself tomorrow doing what I have planned.  I'm excited about it.

So here's the slight change the Lord showed me about kindness this week.  Did you know the Bible says Love is patient and love is kind?  Now I have always taken those two things to be separate things.  In other words, Love is patient.  In a completely unrelated event, Love is kind.  But what I am just getting a grasp on is what happens if we combine the two at the same time.

In other words, what would happen if while I was being patient with someone and waiting on them to change or do something I want, etc., I do a kind act to that person or in that situation.  As I said last time, patience creates the space Love needs to grow and work.  If that's true, kindness is a fertilizer that helps love grow.  While you are waiting on your friend to apologize or your spouse to change, you are being patient and that's showing love.  Now take the next step and fertilize that situation/person with an act of kindness.  It will help you be patient and it will help the situation grow.

Remember this, every time you do an act of kindness, you are operating in Love which means you are operating in God.

An that's another Opinion of the Minion