G: Matthew 11:28-30

Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Just a quick post today. Verse 28 is very relevant to my life right now, and I'm clinging to God's promise of rest as life seems to be getting crazier. It's nice to have that promise, and it IS a promise. God says "I will give you rest." (verse 28.) He doesn't say "I might." He doesn't say "Perhaps." He says "I will." And what a comfort that is!

In Christ and Love,
Gabrielle

G: Ephesians 5:1-2

Ephesians 5:1-2 (ESV)

 ¹ Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. ² And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

These two verses are BibleGateway's verse of the day, and it also happens that this is a subject that weighs on my heart more often than not. In the United States, people (for the most part) don't judge what we believe--they judge what we do. The persecution we face here comes because we hold fast to our faith and the things we believe are right, and we act on it. A lot of times though, when we're criticized we get defensive.


Why?


Because as humans we don't like to be told what to do. Some may be better at taking instruction than others, but as a whole when has humanity ever wanted to listen to instruction? So when someone is trying to tell us how to believe, we defend ourselves, often with a hurt attitude.


Well, that works both ways. Am I saying don't go out and be missionaries (Matthew 28) and gospel sharers? I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that Ephesians 5:2 is key to how we are to go about sharing what we believe and telling others of the good news.


How are we to do that? Let's read again.

Ephesians 5:2 (ESV)

² And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

As Christians, we are commanded to walk in love, the kind of all-encompassing, self-sacrificial agape love that Christ had for us. We're not commanded to order people to change. We're not told to scream them down, or to tell them they're going to Hell, or to ridicule or embarrass them.


We are simply called to walk in love.


A lot of non-Christians you talk to will tell you that their perception of a Christian is someone who is close-minded and who shoves their beliefs down others' throats without any regard to what that person may already believe. Many I've talked to are shocked when I tell them what the Bible has to say about love--how Christians were not called to condemn, but to love those around us and share the love of God through that. By loving others and loving God, we are pressing forward to take hold of the commandments issued in Ephesians 5:1-2.


My personal opinion, and the opinion of Ephesians 5:1-2, is that the "bad cop" approach to Christianity is the wrong way to go about it. You can be persistent in sharing without being aggressive. The approach I often take when sharing is "I'm curious as to what you believe. You're [this religion], right? I don't know much about that." I don't lie, I don't yell. I approach the person as a person, not only as a conversion number. I generally trend toward being a nice person, and so I just act like myself while keeping in mind that we are called to love.

It's really hard when someone doesn't agree with your beliefs, and you think they're wrong. Who doesn't want people to believe like we do? The natural thing is to get defensive and say "But you're wrong!" The Bible doesn't say don't tell them they're wrong--but it does say to do it with love.

 I keep using the word "love," but many people have different definitions of what love is. The definition I am using comes from 1 Corinthians 13:

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (ESV)

 ⁴ Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant ⁵ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Today, my goal is to walk in love, remembering to love those around me as Christ loved us. I often have to work at not insisting I'm right, because like many people I love to be right. And so today I am going to start working on not insisting that I be right, and instead listening to what other people have to say as well.


 In Christ and Love,
Gabrielle

Welcome

Welcome to my little corner of the internet. I'm Gabrielle, a college student learning to seek God with my whole heart while reaching out to love on the people around me. I've done my own quiet time for a while now, but seldom do I write about it. That leads to forgetting what I read, which defeats the whole purpose of the quiet times. Here I'll be posting what I think and learn each day in my quiet time with my Savior. This is my way to keep myself accountable. If you (the reader) want to comment on or discuss anything in my posts, feel free to. I'd love to discuss and learn more. Personal quiet times are wonderful, and community discussion is sometimes even better.

My goal is to post once per day in order to keep myself accountable and retain what I read. The title of this blog, Two-Penny Promises, comes from the story of the widow's mites found at a glance in Luke 21:

Luke 21:1-4 (ESV)
The Widow's Offering

¹ Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, ² and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. ³ And he said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. ⁴ For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.”

I strive to live a life such as the widow did--giving everything that I have to God, even when I don't have much to give.

My posts will likely be made in the mornings, right after or during my quiet times. We'll see as the Spirit allows.

My boyfriend will be joining in on this as well, so there will also be posts from him. We'll distinguish between the two, don't worry. :)

In Christ and love,

Gabrielle