Devotional Song: Go to this link - … Please take the time to see a video of Scott Underwood singing his poignant tribute to sacrificial love, This Is Love, reminding all Christians of the ultimate witness of life, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, and why this is the reason our lives should be witnesses of living sacrifice; … and THEN ON THIS LINK - - where we hear Avalon singing Testify To Love, proclaiming how our lives, lived for Christ, should be a testimony to God’s love.
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Highlight Passage: 1st John 3: 16 … [NKJV] … Interesting how in John’s first letter - chapter 3, verse 16 … he writes essentially the same message as in John 3: 16 …
16 By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
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Highlight Context - NKJV: 1st John 3: 16-23 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK …
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Reference Passage #1: John 3: 16 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK … Of course, what other verse would point to God’s love any better …
Reference Passage #2: John 13: 34-35 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK … Others know we really have the love of God in our hearts when we’re willing to share our lives with others - sacrificially !!
Reference Passage #3: Acts 1: 8 … [NKJV] … Our way of witnessing to God’s love is to share it with others …
8 " ... But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Reference Passage #4: Romans 12: 1-2 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK … Read of God’s declaration of God’s love being our witness of becoming a “living sacrifice” …
My Journal for Today: Today’s Our Daily Bread devotional entry, authored by Jennifer Benson Schuldt, wrote about God’s love being on display in this world so very dramatically when someone is willing to give their lives in total self-sacrifice for someone else, perhaps jumping into a raging river, saving someone, but drowning in the process. Or we read if the incredible stories of Medal of Honor winners who died by jumping on a grenade to save their compatriots in battle.
And all of these can certainly be incredible witnesses to God’s love being shared by someone dying to save another. God’s witness to us - His ultimate witness of sacrificial love - was certainly that of dying on the cross that we would have life eternal; and that was the message of both of the Apostle John’s “3: 16” messages (see John 3: 16 and 1st John 3: 16). And in both of these passages, God’s love is witnessed to all believers in His ultimate act of sacrifice on the cross of His death as the Lamb of God to give us access to eternal life.
But in today’s ODB devotional, I couldn’t help but be reminded that we don’t have to die to be a witness to God’s love. … NO, … we can live and, as Paul, proclaims in Romans 12: 1-2 [linked above], we can be - and should be - a witness of “living sacrifice” to others. That’s what Jesus was teaching about … our witness of love in John 13: 34-35, where He proclaimed that the world would only know His love if Christians were willing to share His love by our love being extended - first to other Christians - and then to any and all who need it.
And that’s why I’m sharing a photo of how I see God’s love, being witnessed to me, sacrificially, EVERY DAY, by the one in this photo who doesn’t look like me. I’m the recipient of God’s “living sacrifice,” His witness of love, every day. I see the love of God on display as my “Elly B” so willingly shares it with me; and I pray that. in some way - every day - I share His love with her.
Enough said … at least from me …
My Prayer for Today … Lord, help me to share Your love with my dear one first and then to anyone You show me who needs my living sacrifice of love and witness today. … Amen
Blogger Note: Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled Our Daily Bread [TGIF], distributed online via email by RBC Ministries. If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you’ll find a link to read the Our Daily Bread blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.
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