{"id":5343,"date":"2022-12-18T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-12-18T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/?p=5343"},"modified":"2022-12-02T16:21:06","modified_gmt":"2022-12-02T23:21:06","slug":"fourth-sunday-of-advent-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/?p=5343","title":{"rendered":"Fourth Sunday of Advent: Love"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s the Fourth Sunday of Advent, and the message of love could not be more important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drbobewell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/image.png?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"430\" height=\"548\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drbobewell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/image.png?resize=430%2C548&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5344\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drbobewell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/image.png?w=430&amp;ssl=1 430w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drbobewell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/image.png?resize=235%2C300&amp;ssl=1 235w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 430px) 100vw, 430px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I just saw something in Revelation 2, letters to the seven churches, that I hadn&#8217;t seen before. It&#8217;s the first letter, to the church at Ephesus. Their credentials seem impeccable:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>I know your works, <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>your toil and <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>your patient endurance, and <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>I know you are <\/em>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>enduring patiently and <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>bearing up for my name\u2019s sake, and <\/em><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>you have not grown weary. (Revelation 2.2, 3, ESV, bulleted for clarity)<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Great list! They worked hard, had patient endurance, and held straight theology, discerning the false from the true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>BUT,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. (Revelation 2.4, ESV)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Love. For whom? For God? Maybe. For each other? Possibly. How about for their neighbors? It&#8217;s that last option that I&#8217;ve never heard mentioned. Jesus was clear: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.<sup> <\/sup>This is the great and first commandment. <strong>And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.<\/strong> (Matthew 22.37 &#8211; 39, ESV, emphasis mine)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I don&#8217;t think we do such a good job at loving our neighbors. I know there&#8217;s a lot of bad stuff in our culture right now, and some conservative Christians have done an excellent job communicating our disapproval of a lot of values and behaviors. But we have not done as good a job at loving the people with those values and behaviors. I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;ve accurately reflected God&#8217;s character:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5.8, ESV)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8230;God\u2019s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance. (Romans 2.4, ESV)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s Advent, and why did Jesus come?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. (1 Timothy 1.15, ESV)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s Advent, and how was Jesus perceived? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>&#8230;you say, &#8220;Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!&#8221; (Luke 7.34, ESV)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s the Fourth Sunday of Advent, and the message of love could not be more important. I just saw something in Revelation 2, letters to the seven churches, that I hadn&#8217;t seen before. It&#8217;s the first letter, to the church at Ephesus. Their credentials seem impeccable: I know your works, Great list! They worked hard, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/?p=5343\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Fourth Sunday of Advent: Love<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8X9bo-1ob","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5343"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5346,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5343\/revisions\/5346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbobewell.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}