a new week

“Each morning, remind yourself that, for whatever reason, God loves you.”

That’s what I told a few hundred people on Sunday.

On Mother’s Day, I preached. I wanted to have some simple application from Titus 2. I wanted to walk out with a simple list of doable actions that reflect what Paul tells Titus about how to live. I wanted. Not just the congregations.

Because you and I hear a lot about how to live. We hear a lot about how to follow. We say a lot about how to live. We say a lot about how to follow.

But lots of us, on any given day, don’t do nearly as much to follow Jesus as we think we should, and we think we should.

Our problem starts with thinking that we have to prove something to God, that we have to measure up in some way. And that first statement allows us to remind ouselves each day that we don’t.

Dont’?

Don’t have to measure up to God’s love. Don’t have to earn it. Don’t have to win it. But have to accept it.

That’s the hard part, some days. Actually accepting that you are loved creates a sense of obligation, it seems. It creates a sense that there is some next step, something that will need to be done. It means that in some way, some control is being lost.

What if, however, we are losing control of a situation which we never really were managing that well anyway? I don’t run my life very well. I don’t have control of the options, of other people, of the crises that will appear this week.

This week, we’ll look at the five actions I suggested this morning, starting here:

“Each morning, remind yourself that, for whatever reason, God loves you.”