The Qualities of Love
For the last number of devotionals, we have focused our attention on how love is such a vital quality to the Christian life. We have seen that unless we love, any of the spiritual gifts are meaningless.
We have also seen that God has deposited His love in us already, and as a result, it is our responsibility to choose to express that love. It is not something we can put on God's shoulders. We must take on that obligation.
So what do those qualities of love really look like? I want to share with you 1 Corinthians 13 from the Amplified Bible, but I want to do it with a twist. I want to make it personal and show how, if we choose to love as God has asked us to love, it will look.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8 from the Amplified Bible…personalized (read it out loud),
I endure long, and I am patient and kind. I am never envious or boil over with jealousy. I am not boastful or vainglorious. I do not display myself haughtily. I am not conceited, arrogant, or inflated with pride. I am not rude or unmannerly. I do not act unbecomingly. God's love in me does not insist on its own rights or its own way for I am not self-seeking. I am not touchy or fretful or resentful. I take no account of the evil done to me. I do not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but I rejoice when right and truth prevail. I bear up under anything and everything that comes, and I am ever ready to believe the best of every person. My hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and I endure everything without weakening. God's love in me never fails.
I challenge you to read this out loud to yourself every day for a month, and see if it does not change your life!
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