"patience" Tagged Sermons

Matthew, love thy neighbour, love your neighbour, compassion, forgiveness, patience, temperance

Devotional: Love Thy Neighbour

In a world that is full of anger and frustration, it’s easy to allow our resentments to simmer. Nonetheless, Jesus reminds us that we are called to be peacemakers.

We are asked to love all neighbors, irrespective of their race, creed, color, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender expression, age, height, weight, physical or mental ability, and marital status.

Making peace begins within:

Until we have taken the sty from our own eye, we cannot say that we will make peace for others in our neighborhood or community.

So, consider for a moment: what triggers you? 

What makes you angry when you read the news? Who do you feel threatened by? Which neighbors are you struggling to love?

The TRUTH will set us free:

What resentment or anger am I feeling today towards another that I have not forgiven and dealt with?

This is our starting point! Feeling angry or fearful does not feel spiritual. You may be tempted to ignore it. Perhaps you tell yourself “I shouldn’t feel this way” – but failing to deal with the truth of your emotions leads to living a lie. ]When we ignore what we are truly experiencing and fail to do the inner work, there will be no fruit.

When we feel anger – or a certain person or situation triggers us – we have an opportunity to do the inner work of forgiveness and letting go. The first step in healing is to acknowledge the truth of what we feel. Then, we can ask for forgiveness.

We are promised that all this will be taken from us and we will be renewed! But in order for healing to take place, we have to be willing to let it go.

Loving God in order to love another

If we say that we love God, and we fail to love our neighbor, we lie to ourselves!

Loving God is seeing everyone else around us through the eyes of God. Because when we love God with heart and soul and mind – our heart connects to another through God’s heart. When we love Gop with all our minds – our mind thinks about others as God does. When we love with all our soul – we see their soul as God does.

Journal prompts:

journal prompts, love thy neighbour, love your neighbour

If you have time, sit down and journal these questions and answers for yourself.

  • What situations in the news recently have triggered anger, resentment, fear, or frustration in me?
  • What is the emotion that I am truly feeling?
  • Does this emotion or feeling remind me of any person or situation in my past?
  • Is there something or someone in my past that I have not yet forgiven, that I need to release and let go so that the truth can set me free at this moment?
  • Now that I have forgiven this person – how do I feel about the current situation and news?
  • Have I forgiven myself for holding onto these emotions all this time?
  • Is there someone I need to ask forgiveness from?
  • Are there any other emotions that I need to acknowledge and release?
  • How can I express love and compassion this week?

Matthew 22:36-40 King James Version (KJV)

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Thou shalt love thy neighbour, love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind, patience, kindness, compassion

Mount up with wings like eagles, wait on the Lord, wait, rest, run, walk, weary, faint

Mount up with wings like eagles

Readings:  Isaiah 40: 21- 31 Mark 1: 29-39 Isaiah 40:21-31 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) 21 Have you not known? Have you not heard?     Has it not been told you from the beginning?     Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? 22 It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,     and its inhabitants…

light, Holy Spirit, spirit, godly, saintly, Christian, Christ, Jesus, filled, repentance

Let there be light

Readings: Genesis 1: 2-3 …And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. 3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. Mark 1:4-11 4 John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  … 8 I have baptized you with water; but he…

prayer, fasting, pray, God, Lord, feed the poor, heal the sick, widows, orphans, look after, care for, church

Prayer & Fasting

This morning we are looking at Isaiah once again, but now a chapter towards the end.  You may recall that as a whole book, I explained that it can be viewed as 2 parts, chapters 1 to 39, and then from chapter 40 to the end. As a whole, Isaiah addresses the Babylonian exile of…

woman, women, helper, mate, partner, equal, gender rights, discrimination, equality, Bible, God, Jesus, Christians

A helper who is just right

Lectionary Genesis 2:18-24 A helper who is “just right” You’ve all heard the 10 reasons why God created, Eve, right? God worried that Adam would always be lost in the garden because He knew men would never ask for directions. God knew that Adam would one day need someone to hand him the TV remote…

words, tongue, gossip, truth, think, feelings, criticism, self-control, speak, control

We all stumble in many ways

If you asked me to name my favourite book of the Bible, I would be hard-pressed to choose between Proverbs and James.  This could be because James seems to be so knowledgeable about Proverbs.  The book of James is quite short:  it has only five chapters and is known for its practical wisdom and common sense.…

mistakes, learning, growth, change

We all make mistakes sometime…

Lectionary: 2 Samuel 11: 1-15 The story of David is not about a saint. He had many faults, numerous sins throughout his life. As John Walton writes, “God has not given us the Bible with the intention that we put the heroes of the faith up on pedestals of awe and reverence. In contrast, we…

We’re Walking Here

There was a wonderful op-ed in the NY Times this week about the ways people transport themselves safely from one place to another in Manhattan. There are cabs, buses, cars, subways, and bicycles – more bicycles than ever, and the roads are getting friendlier to them all the time — but in New York City,…