PART TWO: (GOD FIRST AND LAST....And in everything In-between)
The word of God demands that we love Him; with all our hearts, and with all our soul, and with all our mind, and with all our strength – indeed, with all of ourselves...and to love our neighbors even as we love ourselves.
That is God's kind of love, which He shed abroad in our hearts when we met Him, when we chose Him above whosoever and above whatsoever.
That is the heavenly standard of love, the love that binds Christians together in Christ – the love that passes all understanding.
When we consciously, and persistently, walk in God's kind of love, we unconsciously manifest His true righteousness, we carry the savor of Christ from place to place – walking in the perfect will of God in His Christ.
By godly standards, the closest neighbor to a Christian is a fellow Christian - irrespective of race, tribe, color, language, tribe, etc.
In true Christianity, that is, the Christianity that Jesus Christ purchased with His life blood, every other form of human relationship is inferior, and submits to our love for God and for His Christ - which love translates, unconsciously, unto unfeigned love for fellow Christians.
In the absence of true love, for God and for His Christ, translating into true love for fellow believers, Christianity becomes a mere formality, something that folks practice laboriously – a form of godliness; but lacking in all heavenly content.
Sadly, that is the larger picture of today's Christianity – and this is worldwide.
Christ did not leave us without examples, of what true love, His Father's love, is all about. In the days of His flesh, when confronted with a choice, between His earthly family and His followers, He bluntly chose the latter!
We cannot be more righteous than Christ, for God’s sake! If we must manifest Christ on earth, we must walk even as He Himself walks – for as He is so we must be in this life, unless we are mere reprobates!
Whosoever would love family, race, color, tribe, nation, culture, or indeed, any other form of human relationships, more than Christ, is not worthy to be called His follower! If you doubt this, ask Christ Himself.
Search yourselves this day: do you truly love God? Do you love Christ as you profess day by day – do you love fellow Christians as you love yourself?
Put in the right perspective: do you love fellow Christians more than you love your race, your tribe - more than you love your very nation?
True Christianity prides itself and towers above all patriotic and family instincts and will always do. Nations will come and go, even family – but our bond in Christ endures forever.
*(Watch out for part three of this message. Remain blessed as you read on)*
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