First
Larry was the person who first recruited me to be a pastor years ago. Whenever I think of him, even now, I feel encouraged.
Why?
Larry cared for me and respected me before I did anything to earn it. Matt of fact, now that I think of it, I never did anything that fully earned the level of support and love he gave me.
He loved me first.
I have no doubt that the positive experience I had as a new pastor was the result of Larry’s love.
This Sunday at the Gathering Church I will teach from 1 John 4:1-21. The passage contains perhaps some of the most well known verses about God’s character and the priority of his love.
Religious and spiritual experience gets totally warped and actually becomes bad for us when the order of God’s love gets reversed. It is too easy to act as if we’ve got to do something to get God to love us.
In Love 2: The Way of God we connect again to what happens when we know that we are loved first.