Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Love: Loving God

Hi sweet friends!! So, I know we have talked a lot this week about how God loves us (which is super awesome truth!)... but today I (Jamie) am going to talk to you about how WE love God...

It's easy for us to understand that we need to love God, but it's not so easy to know WHAT that looks like for us. I know for a lot of us we feel like we are loving God, but when we really dig deep and take a look at our lives we see a different picture. You see, in today's culture especially, our hearts are divided because of idols. What are idols you ask?? Well, for me.. a huge idol in my life is MARRIAGE. I obsess over wedding magazines, I have 150+ pins on my wedding Pinterest board, I am constantly thinking about getting married. Idols can be ANYTHING that you put first in your life. BUT what I have learned is that we need to increase our love for God so that our love for earthly things decreases. It's easy to love the glory of earthly things: beauty, sports championships, new clothes, etc. but it is in the same way that we need to love God.
Ascribe glory to the Lord! :)

In the bible it says to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength (Deut. 6:5) Do you think we can fully love God if we are so concentrated on our earthly idols?! NO!! This doesn't mean that we shouldn't have goals and aspirations, what it means is that we have to learn to love God FIRST and let him take care of the desires of our heart (Psalm 37:4). This isn't an easy task but with discipline it will start to come naturally, and even become fun!! 
I love to love God. 

Other than ridding of the idols in our life, another way that we can love God is by spending time with Him!! Another verse in the bible that I love (and had above my bed my 2nd year of college!) is Matthew 6:21. It says "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." What this means to me is that if I put my treasure in my relationship with Christ then that's where my heart will be. I will ENJOY spending time reading my bible, I will ENJOY praying, I will ENJOY going to church.......

I pray that y'all will seriously take a look at your life and see what your idols might be. Take a minute to just talk to God, spend time with Him, and tell Him that you want Him to be first in your life and not all of these silly earthly things we obsess over. 
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"Remember: Because God is God we can never "arrive" at the goal of believing and loving Him as we should. More is always possible!"

My favorite quote ever about why it's important to love God...
"No, God does not need us to love Him. But oh, how we need to love God. For what we love determines what we seek. What we seek determines what we think and do. What we think and do determines who we are-and who we will become."

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A few more bible verses for y'all to check out about LOVING GOD

John 15:5-8
Psalm 116:1

Love ALWAYS,
Jamie

5 comments:

  1. I really liked/needed to hear this one! Thanks Jamie.

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  2. Awesome truth and honesty, Jamie. If we give all our earthly desires to him and pour out our love on Him, he will bless us with so much more than we could imagine!!

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  3. WOW!!! You girls are amazing and I am honored to have you all in my life I am praying for you all and your blog that God will do some amazing things and change the world trough your act of obedience!! Yall are AMAZING!!!!

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  4. I loved how you incorporated idols, and it so true because when we remove those idols we become more focused on our GREAT GOD :) !! It's not always easy to give up what we want, but you and I both know that it is well worth it ! I always lean on this verse, "delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart" Stay focused on God, and I know in His timing I will get to see my beautiful best friend walking down the isle in white :) !!!!! Love you!

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  5. Great post! I think it's good to point out that idols aren't always bad things. Meaning, it's not always about worshiping a statue or engaging in sinful activities. Sometimes our idols are things that would otherwise be deemed as good. In fact, sometimes our idols are gifts from God. But we have to be careful that we're worshiping and giving thanks to God, not the idols. Marriage is certainly not bad, but I understand how that can become an idol in your life. My pastor pointed out recently that often we spend our time praying for God to give us idols. God, give me more money, more stuff, fulfill my desires... Is that loving God or loving stuff? It's easy to fool ourselves into thinking we're loving God by praying for things...but what is truly the desire of your heart in that prayer? If it's the stuff, then those things are idols in your life. Crazy, huh??

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