February 2013
Women’s Ministry FUMC Berkeley Springs, WV
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Love Is Like Fine China A china cabinet full of beautifully ornate, 24-carat gilt-edged dishes sits in the corner of my dining room. I’ve never eaten a speck of food off them. Why? I think they are just too “too.” Too pretty, too fragile, too valuable, and too sentimental to use. And too clean—if I take the dishes out I’ll have to wash them! Admiring their blue and gold pattern from across the room at lunch one day, I looked down at the cheap paper plate under my sandwich and realized there was a deeper “too” reason. They were just too good. Too good for me that is. My china is beautiful, perfect, and pristine. I’m not. I might break a plate, chip a cup, or scratch a golden edge. I’m not worthy to be trusted with something of such value. It’s often the same way I feel about God’s love—that I’m not worthy of it. I’m afraid to allow the beauty of God’s love to be used, really used, in my everyday life, because I’m the chipped, cracked, and broken one. Dare I believe in the fullness of God’s love he desires to pour into me? Agape, that is what God’s love is—a love without expectation of anything in return. It’s a beautiful love we inherit through the shed blood of Jesus that remains perfect even as we remain imperfect. It’s a rare and precious gilt-edged love like my fine china, yet it’s meant to be taken off the shelf and lived. And each day I allow God to fill my cup with agape I become a little less chipped and a little more gilt around the edges. Tomorrow I’ll eat my sandwich on a china plate. Next week I’ll serve tea to some friends in my china cups. From now on I’ll try to allow the fine china of God’s love to live in me and through me…in a real life display. Because…Agape is just too good, too pretty, and too indestructible not to share.
THE WORD “We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.” —1 John 4:16 “Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God.” —1 John 4:7
Think About It What fine china or precious item lives only on display in your house? How can you use it in real life to share God’s agape love this month?