Love Others
“But when God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by His grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me…”
Galatians 1:15
Paul, the author of well over half the New Testament, was not always a writer, pastor, apostle – or even a follower of Christ. There was a good portion of his life where he violently opposed the people he would later make desperate attempts to reach. In his own words he “intensely persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it” (Gal. 1:13). Yet in retrospect, and by revelation from the Holy Spirit, he can quickly tell the people of Galatia that during this same period he was set apart by God to have Christ revealed through him. He, like many on earth today, was a walking paradox. He was loved, pursued and called by God, yet blind to the identity Christ died to give him. On the exterior he was angry, hateful and antagonistic, yet through God’s eternal perspective he was chosen and forgiven.
How many “Paul’s” surround us today? How many need our prayers, encouragement, kindness and God’s Word as the Holy Spirit leads them to encounter Christ? This week, let’s be reminded that those who look the roughest on the outside are still loved by God with the same love He felt for His Son – and God calls us to love them also.
Pastor Cris Buck