Prayer devotional - love

Today is an in between chapter devotional on prayer.  We will come back to Zechariah 14 on Monday.  We have looked at prayer in regards to the harvest; we have looked at tarrying in prayer; we have looked at the unity that comes when we gather to pray; and today we will look at the love displayed through prayer to God and to each other.  Let's look as some Scriptures together.

In John 13:34 and 35, Jesus says,

"I give you a new command:  Love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another."

One of the things that Jesus did for His disciples over and over again was to pray for them.  He taught them how to pray.  He spent the night in prayer for them before presenting their names as His disciples.  We show our love for each other and for God when we take the time to pray to God and pray with others.  May we have more opportunities to pray with each other to our great, great God.  

Jeremiah 24:7 says,

I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the LORD.  They will be My people, and I will be their God because they will return to Me with all their heart.

Do you sense the love that God has for His people and the love His people have for Him?  We have the reference of the heart which we associate with the emotion of love.  It is a symbol of this positive reaction to one another.  How do we know God?  We talk to Him.  We listen to Him.  We read of Him.  Much of that is done through prayer.  As we pray, we receive guidance to His word and it results in us abiding in Him and also at times returning to Him.  We return with all our heart.  Our love for God is growing and encompassing all of us toward Him.

Philippians 2:13 says,

For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to His good purpose.

God is continuing to love us.  He is working in us.  He is providing to us purpose that is glorifying to Him.  While He is loving us, we are given opportunities to love Him more.  The growth in love needs to come from us.  Again, how do we grow more in love with God?  I think it would be hard to answer this question without saying that we spend more time speaking to Him like,  "God what would You want me to do today?"; "God, work through me, to show others who You are."; and "God, thank You for Your love."

Colossians 3:12-14 says,

Therefore, as God's chosen ones, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a grievance against another.  Just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive.  Above all, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.

Wow, what a list and what an "above all."  The list requires us to pray.  We need to pray to put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.  We need to pray to bear with one another and forgive one another and especially those who have grievance against us.  We need to pray to follow God's example of forgiveness.  We need to pray to put on the "above all" of love which brings unity which we talked about in our last devotional on prayer.  We need to pray about love and being loving.

Our last passage of the morning is 1 John 4:7-11 which reads,

Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.  The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.  God's love was revealed among us in this way:  God sent His one and only Son into the world so that we might live through Him.  Love consists in this:  not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.  Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.

Our motivation for loving others is because God has loved us.  We see God's love for us through the sending of His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on a cross in our place to pay our penalty so that we could live in glorification of God through Jesus Christ's willing sacrifice.  This is the definition of God's love.  God's love is described by this action of His toward us.  Do we love others this way?  Do we give of ourselves to others so that they might know of God and His Son Jesus Christ?  Again, another thing to definitely pray about because we spend so much time with a focus on ourselves and not others or not on our God.  Prayer brings us more in love with who we are to love.  Let us pray.

"Lord, what great verses to show us this morning how important love is; how much You love us; and what love does to us and through us that comes from You.  Help us to utilize prayer in our efforts to love You and others more.  May we see how important these quiet times are with You for Your love to be seen through us.  Amen."

Pastor Adam