I LOVE YOU AND GOD BLESS YOU

To all of my family and friends, colleagues and co-workers and classmates, associates and acquaintances, preachers and teachers, I just wanted you to know that I love you, each and every one of you, and I pray that The Good Lord will bless you today and continue to bless you.

Today is a special day, and every day is a special day because The Lord God made each one of them.  I will rejoice and be glad in it and I pray that you will also.  While we celebrate and appreciate this glorious Lord’s Day let us say a kind word to someone and encourage them.  Today is a good day for us to do random acts of kindness and demonstrate the love of God.  Let’s not wait until their “Homegoing Celebration” to say something good about someone.  Let the people in your life know that you love them, tell them and show them, while they can appreciate it.

I love you and may God bless you.

Rev Wendell

LOVE IS GIVING NOT RECEIVING

Proclamation:

“In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words The Lord Jesus himself said: 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"  Acts 20:35 (NIV)

Explanation:

Luke, the careful researcher and accurate historian who was a traveling companion and the personal physician of the Apostle Paul, recorded here the words of Paul as he spoke and quoted The Lord Jesus.  Paul's point was that he did not preach and teach for money, he worked to provide for himself, and to use his earnings to help support the poor.  He also encouraged the people to do likewise, because as Jesus said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive."

Application

All too often today people are selfishly concerned with what they will receive, and care very little about giving to help others.  This attitude also pervades many of our personal relationships.  We often say that we love our friends, but we are more concerned with what we can get from them, or what they can do for us.  We use our friends for our personal benefit, we don't love them.  That is not Christ-like behavior.  Jesus was a giving person, and He taught that it was better to give than it was to receive.  He loved His friends, He shared information with them (Matthew 5:1-2), He shared food with them (Matthew 14:19-21), and He was willing to give up His life for them. (John 15:13-14)  His love was, and still is more concerned with others than with Himself.  Love is kind and it is not self-serving. (1 Corinthians 13:4-7)  Love is giving and not concerned about receiving.  God is love. (1 John 4:8 and 4:16)  It is better, and more Christ-like, to give to others than it is to receive from them.