Tag: love

Blessed Singleness

By Ife J. Ibitayo

We all tend to neglect the benefits of the season of life we’re in. When I was completing my bachelor’s degree, the end of the rainbow was the beginning of my master’s degree. Then it became the beginning of my working career. Now it’s retirement. Similarly, most of us don’t appreciate the benefits of the relational season of life God has placed us in. Every single single person I know is pining after their wedding day. All married people are waiting for children. Then as soon as these little, nutty creatures are born, they want to be empty nesters and grandparents.

An intriguing article I read called “Is Anticipation Even Better Than the Real Thing?” said, “The pleasure derived from anticipating something enjoyable is often equal to or greater than the pleasure derived from the event itself. This is because we’re inventing and idealizing the future.”

 When we anticipate the future, we think our future wife will be the implacable Carol Brady, the perceptive Claire Huxtable, and the vivacious Vivian Banks all rolled into one. But when she loses her temper or burns the cookies (again) or zonks out at 9 o’ clock for the tenth day in a row, we suddenly realize our earth angel is all too human. Conversely, we minimize the benefits of our current season and magnify its drawbacks.

Time

One of the most important benefits of singleness is time, which meaningful relationships tend to gobble up. It takes time to call my friends each week and drive to my cousin’s each month and fly home to my family each year.  I perpetually find myself in need of more time, not less. The extra free time I have allows me to take long prayer walks in my neighborhood. It has encouraged me to open my home to young adults on Thursday nights and serve in a variety of capacities at my church. And it has given me a chance to plug away at my many writing projects: including this blog you’re reading right now.

Flexibility

Secondly, singleness grants me flexibility that married people don’t have. I once called up a friend of mine who’d checked into an alcohol recovery program in southern Virginia. I offered to drive down to see him that same night, and though he turned me down, I realized later that these are the kinds of offers only singles can make (in good conscience).

Conclusion

Someone once said, “singleness is the gift everyone’s looking to regift.” I admit, I wrestle with this idea daily. Almost by the hour I find myself silently praying for God to send me my special someone. But I’ve slowly come to appreciate the unique privileges of singleness. We regret the opportunities that we let pass us by. So I’m trying to wring out every drop of this blessed season of my life until the next one comes.

“Godliness with contentment is great gain.”

(1 Timothy 6:6)

Standing Above the Lovelorn Sea

By Ife J. Ibitayo

If winter is the season I hate the most, February is its worst month. January at least has New Year’s Day, and I still bask in warm reminiscence of March’s spring break. But the month of February has no holidays, well any worth celebrating when you’re single.

Fresh flowers, cuddly bears, and red hearts assail me at grocery stores. Affectionate couples shame me at dine-in restaurants and movie theatres. Twenty-eight days mock me with a singular reminder: “You’re all alone, buddy.”

This pain is especially personal to me because I was ready to be married by the time I turned fifteen. Yep, by then I’d already hung up my cap, kissed my bachelor glory days goodbye, and poised my pen to write a new chapter in my story. Fast forward a decade later and that page has remained (astonishingly) blank. Being a romantic at heart, I embraced several of our culture’s fallacies about love.

You’re Nobody Until Somebody Loves You

The first lie I believe was best sung by the venerable Dean Martin: “You’re nobody ‘til somebody loves you.” I wanted to be somebody! I took growing up in a loving family for granted. My parents and my brothers have to love me. I wanted someone who didn’t have to have me in their life, but of all the men on the face of this planet, they chose me alone forever.

You’re Half a Person Until You Meet Your Other Half

The second lie I accepted was that you’re incomplete until you meet your other half. I felt this “truth” viscerally, like a hole in my soul that could only be filled by the right woman. She’d alleviate my insecurities, heal my scars, and secure my destiny. Therapist Esther Perel said it well, “We come to one person, and we are asking them to give us what an entire village used to provide. Give me belonging, give me identity, give me continuity, but give me transcendence and mystery and all in one.” In short, she’d be my salvation.

Your Somebody/Your Other Half

As outsized as this expectation may sound, I actually don’t think it’s wrong. It just took me the better part of a decade to realize that it was misplaced. Appropriating a well-known quote from C.S. Lewis, “If we find ourselves with a desire that no being in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another being.” And that being is the one who made us: God.

Through the overwhelming pain and triumphant victories I’ve experienced in life, I’ve learned that God is my best friend, my confidant, and my lover. Someone did choose me alone forever for a loving relationship. Ephesians 1:4 says, “Even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes.” And my relationship with Him has given me belonging, identity, and continuity. For 1 John 3:1 says, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!” God is my transcendence and my mystery all in one!

Conclusion

My relationship with God has not weakened my desire to find my soulmate. Rather, it has provided a safe harbor to continue looking from. Until I find her, I know I stand high above the lovelorn seas. I rest in the arms of my heavenly Father until He sweeps me up in the triune bliss of romantic love.  

“The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.”

(Jeremiah 31:3)

Naked and Unashamed (The Genesis Archives Pt. 3)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

For Part 1, “Let There Be Light”, click here. For Part 2, “Recycling and the Image of God”, click here.

“Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame” (Genesis 2:25).

Naked is not only a provocative word today, but it’s also a rare word. We live in a cover-up culture. Women cover up their faces with foundation, concealer, blush, and mascara. Men cover up their true personalities with brash jokes and crude humor. We all cover up our true selves with carefully crafted photos on Instagram and clips on TikTok. Why is one of the few universal truths of life the need to play make believe?

Naked Before Man

The Bible’s answer is sin. As soon as Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, “Their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves” (Genesis 3:7). Shame only exists when we have something to hide. And from that day on, we’ve been trying to hide from God and from each other.

Yet God hasn’t taken away our desire for intimacy. In many books I’ve read, men have poured out their hearts to their lovers. They know they must expose the skeletons in their closets to the eyes of their special someone. We want to know that our sweetheart can love our unloveliness because instinctively we all know that love can only thrive in exposure, with unclothed hearts and bodies, with the very real threat of rejection overcome by acceptance.

Naked Before God

We know this is true with those we love here on earth, but we act as if it’s not true with God. The author of the book of Hebrews said, “Nothing in all creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked before His eyes” (Hebrews 4:13). God possesses true x-ray vision. He sees every part of us, from our physical form to our invisible spirit. Yet I’m moved by His response to Adam and Eve after the Fall. Genesis 3 says that God went for His daily walk in the garden of Eden. Not seeing His friends, He asks them, “Where are you?” In reply, Adam says, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.” But God said, “Who told you that you were naked” (Genesis 3:10-11)?

God is not playing dumb in this conversation. He is making a crucial point here. He’s saying, “I didn’t say you were naked, so who told you that you were?” He already knew of Adam and Eve’s nakedness when they exposed themselves to sin. But His first response was not condemnation but connection. When Adam and Eve hid from God, He drew near. When they eschewed contact, He initiated conversation because God still loves us, broken messes that we are, even when we mess up.

Conclusion

But there is still the matter of sin. Adam and Eve instinctively knew they had to hide from God after they sinned because sin must be paid for. But what recourse did Adam and Eve have to repay God?

This question will be answered in “The Genesis Archives Pt. 4.”

“As Scripture says, ‘Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.'”

(Romans 10:11)

The Most Dangerous Weapon in the World

By Ife J. Ibitayo

Highs and lows have filled my holiday season. I relaxed with my parents while we watched a blockbuster movie. Then I rushed to the toilet as my dinner found a new home. I played video games with my little brother on my laptop. Then I cursed that same machine for suddenly bricking out on me. Turbulence was my only constant during this past Thanksgiving holiday.

And the same is true for our nation. Within the space of one short week, we celebrated justice as three guilty men were condemned and decried injustice as one guilty man walked free. Or was it three innocent men who were condemned and one innocent man exonerated as many assert? Have I gone too far? Should I just stop talking politics and stick to the Bible?

Dangerous Speech

Speaking of the Bible, John the Baptist was murdered for denouncing injustice. He was incarcerated and eventually beheaded because he called out King Herod for marrying his brother’s former wife. I sat in church one Sunday and heard a message that heaped the blame onto John the Baptist for “veering out of his lane.” His calling was to be Jesus’ forerunner, to prepare the way for the Messiah. But once he’d finished his job, he ran out of topics to cover. So he started speaking on things he had no business talking about. And that was why he was killed (Mark 6:17-18). But since when did the living Word become divorced from the lives we live?

Dangerous Silence

Some say that the Bible is silent on many issues that stir the hearts of Americans today. And they argue, “Where the Bible is silent, we are silent.” But that logic doesn’t hold water. Consider if a mother commands her son not to punch his brother. Then the child starts slapping his sister. When his mother sits in him timeout, does it really make sense for her son to argue, “But you never send anything about punching my sister?”

The same principle applies to the Bible. Some say that the Bible says nothing about abortion. Yet the Bible says, “‘Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in His own image’” (Genesis 9:6). Just because this verse does not explicitly refer to “man” as “helpless baby” doesn’t mean that the Bible says nothing about abortion. Likewise, even though the Bible does not explicitly say “you shall not target other people on the basis of their class, gender, or ethnicity,” it does say, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself. For love does no wrong to one’s neighbor” (Romans 13:9-10).

Conclusion

When Christianity is constrained to Sunday services and church buildings, it becomes dangerously close to a prescription drug we take on a weekly basis. ” But it was crafted to be a “sword that pierces our very souls” (Hebrews 4:12). If we let the Bible dictate the way we view all aspects of our lives–from the way we treat our families, to the way we work our jobs, and even, dare I say, the way we view politics–then it becomes the most dangerous weapon in the world.

“But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves.”

(James 1:22)

The Distance Between Our Foundation and Our Cornerstone

By Ife J. Ibitayo

Even when my parents were struggling to make ends meet, my mother still insisted on sending me to a Christian private school. She hoped to instill in me a love for Christ through consistent messaging at home, at church, and at school. Now my faith is deeply personal, and those early, formative years planted the seeds for it.

However, I didn’t embrace my faith as my own until middle school. When I was transplanted from a private school to a charter school, my new classmates challenged my faith. They forced me to do some serious introspection and answer, “What is the foundation of my faith?” Without that jolt, I’m not certain when, even up till now, I would have answered that question.

A similar shift is occurring throughout the United States. For centuries, the USA was known as a Christian nation. We used to be “one nation under God.” Now we’re many nations under many gods all sharing the same flag. Numerous Christian values that formed the atmosphere we breathed have been uprooted, and we suddenly find ourselves surrounded by strangers.

It’s a bit like senior year of high school. We were on top of the world, but now we’ve “graduated” and find ourselves at the bottom again. The many bastions of society that we took for granted in earlier years have been overturned. Mothers’ right to choose has silenced unborn babies’ right to live. Fluid gender identity has transplanted fixed biology.  And many Christians are furious. In rage, they’ve leapt onto their social media accounts and stormed the ballot boxes to reinstate the sacred principles they believe form the bedrock of Christianity.

Our Cornerstone

But that was not the focus of Christ, our true cornerstone. At the start of His ministry, Jesus described His purpose here on earth as “preaching good news to the poor, proclaiming freedom to captives and sight to the blind, setting free the bound, and declaring the favorable year of the Lord” (Luke 4:18-19). To put it another way, Jesus’ mission was not to transform the government but to transform the governed. He was focused not on policy change but heart change. He spent far less time with the governmental and religious elite of His day and far more time with the destitute and downtrodden.

Now Jesus was angry too. But He directed His anger at the conmen who’d taken up shop inside His holy temple (Matthew 21:12-13). He had no patience for those who saw the gospel as a means of gain rather than great treasure in and of itself (1 Timothy 6:5-6). But toward the lost—the prostitutes, the tax collectors, and foreigners, Christ’s primary response was compassion (Matthew 21:14) and friendship (Matthew 11:19).

Conclusion

Anger is justified. There is quite a bit to be angry about from this past year: the lives this virus has cut off, the dreams this pandemic has shut down, and much more. America is changing significantly in many uncomfortable and frustrating ways. But we should let that anger drive us to love others more, not less. We should use our hands to vote, but then we should use our fingers to help.

1 John 4:18 says, “perfect love drives out fear.” It has the power to drive fear out of the hearts of immigrants who’ve moved into our neighborhoods and just maybe out of our own as well.

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”

(James 1:27)

Friendship or “Friendship” (Love Is… Part 4)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

For Part 1, “Love Is Patient”, click here; Part 2, “Love is Kind”, click here; Part 3, “The Love of the LORD”, click here.

Love–Think of holding hands with your significant other while strolling down lamplit boulevards with a majestic symphonic backdrop. But as stirring as this image is, it’s limited. Deep love comes in a variety of packages, including that between friends. In spite of cupids lurking around every corner during this month of February, I think this is a prime opportunity to study an example of brotherly love found in the Bible.

Friendship

King David’s closest friend was the son of his sworn archenemy, King Saul. His name was Jonathan, and he was the heir apparent to his father’s throne. Yet he did everything possible to ensure his best friend would become king.

King Saul himself said about Jonathan, “‘You son of a perverse and rebellious woman! Don’t I know that you have sided with the son of Jesse to your own shame and to the shame of the mother who bore you? As long as the son of Jesse lives on this earth, neither you nor your kingdom will be established’” (1 Samuel 20:30-31 NIV).

Jonathan did not act against his own best interests because he had a death wish, nor was it because he despised his father. In fact, he was one of his father’s best warriors and died by his side (2 Samuel 1:23). He acted this way because he was a good friend. And he loved David more than he loved himself (1 Samuel 18:1).

“Friendship”

Our culture has morphed friendship to such a degree that this kind of commitment seems strange. “Friends with benefits” is a term used to describe platonic relationships with the “benefit” of sex, but that term accurately describes the kind of “friendships” that abound in society today.

A “friend” is someone who provides access to career advancement or elite cliques. A “friend” is someone who strokes your ego and makes you feel good about yourself. A “friend” is someone who enhances the pool of money, time, and energy you can draw from to accomplish your end goals. And like the dew that flees from the rising sun, their love will vanish at the first sign of heat.

The Difference

With that definition of “friendship” in mind, no wonder so many people devalue it as a stump on the road to marriage and children. But Jesus said, “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13 NLT). He spoke of friendship because the deepness of that relationship should demand sacrifice, not avoid it.

Jonathan wept when he and his best friend parted ways (1 Samuel 20:41-42). He risked his life to speak much needed words of encouragement to David when he was struggling to survive (1 Samuel 23:15-17). And they made promises to each other that outlived the grave (2 Samuel 21:7).

Conclusion

True friendship is as beautiful as it is rare. Just as a miner would have a hard time believing coal is made of the same stuff as precious gemstones, so we have a diminished view of friendship because of the kind of “friends” this world so often offers us. But just like diamonds in the rough, even though friendship may be tough to find, it’s still well worth the search.

“A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity.”

(Proverbs 17:17 NIV)

Love is Kind (Love Is… Part 2)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

For Part 1, Love is Patient, click here.

I still remember the day I found out that I was going to have a little brother. I jubilated for days while the rest of my family groaned (after having two sons, they were really hoping for a daughter). I counted the days till I’d have a mini-me to teach the glorious wonders of basketball, video games, and the Word. Then he was born.

I quickly found out that having a younger sibling was far less about instructing him to come up to my level and far more about coming down to his. I forced goofy grins as I hefted his chubby little body into the air for the hundredth time. I bit my tongue as we watched reruns of Peppa Pig when I’d much rather be enjoying a new season of The Simpsons. In short, I learned the sacrificial, giving nature of love.

Love Is

1 Corinthians 13:4 says, “Love is kind.” The Greek word translated “kind” is “chrésteuomai”, meaning “to be full of service to others”. Love is far more than a feeling of goodwill toward another. It is an inward emotion that leads to outward action. That is why Jesus said, “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13 NLT).

Just as faith without works is dead (James 2:17), so is love without kindness. Apostle James said, “Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, ‘Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well’—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do” (James 2:15-16 NLT)? Love is more than flowery sentiment and good vibrations (1 John 3:18). It’s sacrificing one’s time, energy, and money for the good of another.

Love Isn’t

Kindness encompasses what we refrain from doing as well. “Love does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged” (1 Corinthians 13:5 NLT).

Firstly, love doesn’t demand its own way. It permits the other to choose—the restaurant, the movie, the vacation getaway—even when its well within one’s right to unilaterally make the decision. In doing so, we humbly value others over ourselves (Philippians 2:3).

 Secondly, love isn’t irritable. As we discussed last week, love is patient (1 Corinthians 13:4). It puts up with the sticky hands and screaming voices, the carpet stains and broken dishes, the gaming at 3 AM and the napping at 3 PM.

Lastly, love isn’t vindictive. Just as God flung our sins as far away from us as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12), so we must forgive one another’s faults. No longer should we see them as Lying Laurie or Lazy Lucas. We must see them with the eyes of Christ—as new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Conclusion

 After hearing about how much love demands, it could be easy to try replace it with a cheap substitute. But just as any true Coke lover knows that aspartame is a poor replacement for sugar, real love can never be exchanged. We must love because we’re made in the image of the God of love (Genesis 1:27). And love is kind.

“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)

Love is Patient (Love Is… Part 1)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

As we slide into the month of February, I think it is an especially relevant time to consider love. What is love? What isn’t it? These are the questions I’ll be considering as we dive into 1 Corinthians 13.

When the Apostle Paul began to describe the characteristics of love, the first one he listed was “Love is patient” (1 Corinthians NIV). I believe this choice was very intentional and is an essential attribute of love.

Love or Lust

“An intense yearning for another.” Does this definition describe love or lust? Love is a powerful emotion. The Song of Solomon says that “love is as strong as death, its jealousy as unyielding as the grave” (Song of Solomon 8:6 NIV). But once again, this description could be applied just as accurately to lust. However, when lust is forced to wait, it will exact its vengeance on the object of its affection.

Consider Amnon, son of King David. He had a gorgeous, virgin half-sister named Tamar. His feelings ran so deep that he was depressed morning after morning (2 Samuel 13:4). The NKJV even says that he was losing weight over his lovesickness! After an eternity of waiting, Amnon tricked his half-sister into coming into his bedroom alone, and he raped her (2 Samuel 13:14).

When Amnon finally acquired the focus of his desire, he took out all his agonizing months of waiting upon her. Then he kicked her to the curb and went on with his life (2 Samuel 13:15-19). Amnon’s emotions were clearly lust because of the damage they wreaked upon the one he wanted.

Love, on the other hand, is longsuffering. 1 Corinthians 13 goes on to say that “love doesn’t insist on its own way”. Rather it “bears all things” and “endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:5, 7 ESV). True love takes that debt of pain that accrues while waiting and absorbs it.

Love or Wrath

In a letter to his dearly beloved son in the faith Timothy, Apostle Paul said, “This is a trustworthy saying, and everyone should accept it: ‘Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners’—and I am the worst of them all. But God had mercy on me so that Christ Jesus could use me as a prime example of his great patience with even the worst sinners. Then others will realize that they, too, can believe in him and receive eternal life” (1 Timothy 1:15-16 NLT).

Apostle Paul truly was one of the worst sinners who has ever walked this earth. He was a notorious terrorist, going door to door and dragging off believers to prison and their deaths (Acts 26:10)! He presided over their murders in broad daylight (Acts 7:57-8:1) and extended his zeal even beyond the borders of his own country (Acts 9:1-2)! But the Brother and Father of the men and women Paul destroyed waited patiently for him to see the light. They suffered long his raging persecution. And when they finally won his heart, they didn’t destroy him. Jesus welcomed this terrorist as His brother, and the Father invited this murderer into His household as His son (Romans 8:16-17).

God never exacted vengeance on Paul. Instead, He absorbed the wrath Paul deserved for his sins, and the wrath we deserve for our own, and poured it out on His beloved Son. That, that is love.

Conclusion

Love is patient. I am convinced that very few of us naturally possess this gift of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), and none of us possess it in the measure we should. But we can start afresh today. Instead of lashing out, we can embrace. Instead of coercing more, we can demand less. And we can take the agonizing debt of pain that’s accruing and give it to God.

“Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.”

(Ephesians 4:2 NLT)

A United Faith or a Divided House

By Ife J. Ibitayo

In Jesus’ final prayer for His disciples, the son of God says, “I have given them the glory that You gave Me, that they may be one as We are one—I in them and You in Me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that You sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me” (John 17:22-23 NIV). The world is meant to believe Jesus is God’s Son through the unity of His church.

Yet we live in a time where the church is more divided than ever. Recent events have sent a deep fissure into the bedrock of the American church. The tremors have revealed its shaky foundation and raised some critical questions: What is the church? And why is it still important?

What is the Church?

The church consists of all those on earth who believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. But it’s also far more than this. It’s the vehicle that spreads the good news of Jesus Christ to the nations (Matthew 28:19-20). It is a charitable organization that extends God’s mission of healing the broken and helping the disenfranchised (James 1:27). And it is also the visible manifestation of Jesus Christ living and acting in the world today (Ephesians 1:22-23).

Something I’ve discovered through rereading the gospels is how much the Son and the Father love one another. The Father’s first public words to Jesus Christ were “‘This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased’” (Matthew 3:17 ESV). Every other time the Father speaks in the gospels, He affirms His beloved Son (Luke 9:35; John 12:28). The Father and the Son never bickered. They were never irritated with one another. They never gave up on each other. They perfectly manifested the love the church is supposed to (1 Corinthians 13:4-7).

Why is the Church Still Important?

At the start of His ministry, Jesus quoted His God-given mission from the Old Testament: “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed Me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners” (Isaiah 61:1 NIV). And this mission is supposed to be carried on by His church today. The world is filled with more poor, broken people now than we’ve seen in a very long time. They need good news, freedom, and light. But how are we supposed to share good news with others when we’re constantly bad-talking each other? How are we supposed to bind up the brokenhearted when we’re tearing down our brothers?

Conclusion

One hundred fifty years ago, Abraham Lincoln said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. Seven years later he stood amongst the smoking ashes of a nation that learned that lesson the hard way. If the American church is to survive, we must be unified.

“I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.”

(1 Corinthians 1:10 NIV)

An Apostle’s Farewell (Power of Legacy Pt. 3)

By Ife J. Ibitayo

For Part 1, “Like Father, Like Son”, click here. For Part 2, “Actions Speak Louder than Proverbs”, click here.

Final addresses carry a power few other speeches can. They answer the question, “If I never get the chance to see you again, what must I tell you?”

Vulnerability

In his final message to the leaders of the Ephesian church, Apostle Paul began, “’You know how I lived the whole time I was with you, from the first day I came into the province of Asia. I served the Lord with great humility and with tears and in the midst of severe testing by the plots of my Jewish opponents’” (Acts 20:18-19 NIV).

Firstly, Paul was vulnerable. His courageous leadership was unquestionable. He fought wild animals (1 Corinthians 15:32), braved shipwreck, and suffered beatings (2 Corinthians 11:25). Yet he also wasn’t afraid to put his heart on the line. He loved the members of the Christ’s body as his sons (1 Timothy 1:2), brothers (Philippians 1:12), and mothers (Romans 16:13), and he taught his followers to do the same.

Integrity

Then Paul went on to say, “‘And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace’” (Acts 20:22-24 NIV).

Paul is one of the few leaders in history who has lived in a manner worthy of his preaching. Jesus commanded that all who call themselves Christians should “deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow Him” (Matthew 16:24). The cross was an instrument of suffering and death, and Paul willingly accepted both in order to adorn the message he preached.

Industry

Paul concluded, “‘I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: “It is more blessed to give than to receive”’” (Acts 20:33-35 NIV).

All of us possess God-given visions on our lives. Very few of us realize them because we are not willing to put in the excruciating amount of hard work needed to achieve them. But Paul worked harder than any other apostle (1 Corinthians 5:10) ensuring that his message was above reproach.

Conclusion

When Apostle Paul finished his speech, “They all wept as they embraced him and kissed him. What grieved them most was his statement that they would never see his face again” (Acts 20:37-38a). When some leaders leave their office, their followers rejoice, but for others they weep bitterly. The difference is the legacy they leave behind. Apostle Paul left an incomparable legacy because of his open heart and calloused hands, and we have the opportunity to do the same.

“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.”

(Ephesians 4:1 NIV)