Looking for Love?

If you are over forty, you probably read the title and wanted to break out into song. “Looking for love…in all the wrong places…looking for love…” This Willie Nelson song is well known by most. And the title reflects the reality of our lost world and the culture in which we as Christ followers live. What’s unfortunate, however, is those who are outside the church have often looked to the church for love only to walk away feeling dejected, perhaps even rejected, and empty because they couldn’t find the real love they were searching for. Even when I type out that statement, my heart is saddened. I hope your heart is as well. If not, then, please keep reading because I hope this book will help you begin to realize why we as the Church are part of the problem when it comes to our world b

eing transformed.

The reason I am saddened is because people who are outside the kingdom of God have no happy ending if we truly believe the Scriptures. Their eternal destiny is not in a place of hope or refuge or eternal happiness and joy. The Bible teaches us that the destiny of unbelievers is a place called Hell. The reason hell is bad is not because of the heat and the little red demons we have popularized and reduced hell to be; hell is bad because God isn’t there. The absence of the presence of God. No protection. No provision. No power. No God.

As I am writing this, we are in the midst of another election cycle, and the whole world is in “freak-out” mode about whom the next President will be. Wars are breaking out around the world, terrorism is on the rise, opinions are being thrown out into the social media landscape, and in many American cities there is civil unrest. Some people are even asking, “Where is God?”

God is here. His presence is in His people. Let that sink in. God is present in you through the Holy Spirit. He is present in other believers through the power of the Holy Spirit. Can you imagine what the world would be like if the presence of the Holy Spirit was not in us? If God’s Spirit in the world was gone? Talk about chaos! The world would be much worse than it is right now!

But then the flip side of that idea should make you and I ask, “If the Holy Spirit is in me, and in other believers, what kind of impact could we make?” The key, if you will, to changing or transforming our culture is Jesus on display through us where we live, work, and play everyday. That’s the only way we will see a move of God in our neighborhood or in our nation. Christ in me, the hope of glory, right?
According to Paul’s letter to the Church at Colosse, that’s the way to see a movement of God. I love how the New Living Translation states it: For God wanted them to know the riches and glory of Christ are for you Gentiles, too. And this is the secret: Christ lives in you.

How awesome that CHRIST IN YOU can transform the world! How have you seen God use you?

Share with me in the comments below please.

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