Radical LOVE May 29, 2010
Posted by jherrington in Uncategorized.Tags: Hampton, hungry, Jesus, poor, Radical love, SC, Single mother, widow
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I picked up this topic on the way home from work this morning. I don’t know why and I don’t know where it came from but I decided I would go with it.
There’s no official definition of “radical love.” Better yet, let me tell you what radical love is and is not before I get into the point of this topic.
Radical love IS:
- Selfless
- Uncomfortable
- Productive
- Biblical
Radical love IS NOT:
- Easy
- Motionless
- On Your Terms
- Limited
- Secular
This county is in desperate need of love. Love that goes beyond what anyone in this area has ever seen or experienced. Love that exemplifies what Jesus feels for us. Love that is radical.
A quick peek at thesaurus.com reveals a few synonyms for radical. Extreme. Progressive. Uncompromising. Antonyms? Conservative. Moderate.
I know for me the thing that holds me back from radical love is being in my box. My box is comfortable and doesn’t think I’m weird. My box doesn’t give me funny looks. This past month at LHC we have been talking about boxes. Head over to the web site (click HERE) to check out the sermons. Going back to my lists of what radical love is and is not you can see that those are also descriptions of being inside/outside of your box. My conviction from these sermons has been that we do not offer radical love to our community.
Sure, we will give someone in our church a few bucks for lunch if they need it. I’ll help Will work in his yard any day of the week. Now don’t get me wrong I love my church family and I would do anything I can for any one of them but what about the people outside of those walls? Jesus did not die for the righteous he died a radical death in radical love for people who didn’t deserve it (like you and I)! When I truly understand this and it is on the forefront of my thoughts I get so pumped that I can’t seem to contain myself. I had trouble going to sleep when I got home because I was thinking about radical love. What can I do for this community who needs a grande dose of radical love? Do I need a mocha frappe from Mcdonalds or does a single mother need her power bill paid? Do I need to weed eat the back corner of my lot no one but me sees or does a widow need her grass cut? I used to say that I would help anyone and if it fell into my lap and was convenient for me I certainly would. But what about the other 99% that doesn’t fall into our laps?
This is a call. Don’t just offer love when you can. FIND someone who needs it and offer RADICAL LOVE! This is the beginning of a volatile movement. Something this county has never seen before. Something that will spread so quickly that we won’t have enough room to seat all the people who want to worship Jesus because of the RADICAL LOVE they experienced through you and I. Are you in? Lets do this.
