John 3:16 (ESV)
For God So Loved the World
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
We know that love was so important to God towards us, his children, that he sent his only son to die on a cross that we may have a way to return to him and be with him for all of eternity.
What word has such power to cause someone to go to such drastic measures?
As a child planted within us is a seed that needs to be nourished daily or we will die if not met. That seed is LOVE. Every person needs this seed to be watered, cared for, protected, cherished.
Coming back from watching the new movie about Elton John, the story made clear that although he was given a gift of music, he was driven to attempting suicide for the mere fact that he didn’t feel loved. The money, fame and power never was able to deliver or fulfill the deep rooted need that had been missing since childhood. He did not receive love. We saw that the solution to trying to mask the pain by working harder, drinking, taking drugs, selling his soul all came up short and almost took his life.
Jesus died so we could feel loved, Elton almost died looking for it.
A study from UCLA suggests that a loving parental figure may alter neural circuits in children that could influence health throughout a lifespan.
The September 2013, titled “Childhood Abuse, Parental Warmth, and Adult Multisystem Biological Risk in the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults Study”
Psychology Today 2013
A father’s love contributes as much — and sometimes more — to a child’s development as does a mother’s love. That is one of many findings in a new large-scale analysis of research about the power of parental rejection and acceptance in shaping our personalities as children and into adulthood.
Science daily 2013
Nobel-prize-winning economist James Heckman, has long argued that investing in early childhood education provides a greater return for society than virtually any other type of spending, not only because of increased educational success and productivity, but also because of reduced crime, addiction, distress and disorder. This study, he says, “shows that early life conditions critically affect adult health. Maternal attachment plays a fundamental role in shaping who we are; remove it and the harm is great.”
Time Magazine 2012
Suicide is not a new issue, especially not in celebrity circles. These tragic deaths are also not limited by lines of work ranging from boxers, designers, politicians and writers to actors, musicians and entrepreneurs. The fact that these people – the crème-de-la-crème of our world, in terms of skills, wealth and fame – decided to take their own lives, is what needs to be assessed. The question most people ask is this, “Why would they want to take their own life, when they had ‘everything’?” But did they have everything, or does it even matter what they had or didn’t have in material possessions and fame?
There are a myriad of situations, conditions and causes for a person wanting to take his or her own life, according to a research report released in 2005. The reason for a suicide need not always be because of a mental health issue such as depression or a bipolar disorder. While there are several cases of depressed, schizophrenic and bipolar patients becoming suicidal, it is not universal to these conditions. A person with no clinical mental issues could be suicidal, just as a depressed or mentally stressed person may not be.
But the one factor this report claims as being universal to all suicide victims and suicidal patients is that there is significant to extreme emotional pain suffered – regardless of the source of such pain. The researchers also reiterate that suicide is a flawed and extreme ‘problem-solving’ tactic for these patients – a quick fix.
Loneliness kills. “It’s as powerful as smoking or alcoholism”, Waldinger said in the same Ted talk he gave in 2017. Looking at some of the most prominent suicides this year and before that, loneliness has always been a culprit as friends, colleagues and family have pointed out. This phenomenon doesn’t differ based on who the person is or how much wealth or fame they have amassed in their life.
Gulf News 2018
It doesn’t take but a few minutes for someone to find various forms of research showing that the lack of love and its destructive effects on people’s lives. No-one escapes this need to be filled, be it the wealthy, famous, young or old, race, sex or nationality.
God had much to say about this.
1 Corinthians 13 (ESV)
The Way of Love
“1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”
We are all looking for the same thing, to be loved and to love others.
In order to break this chain of the scarcity of love in this world we must first be filled by and accept the love the God has for us individually. We are called to love our neighbors as God loves us. We don’t need to ask God for anything else but to have him remove from us anything that is blocking us from knowing his love in the depth of our souls.
As we begin to experience this love we will see that we are then able to express the same towards others. Although it is good to donate money to causes, and serve where needed, the best gift you can give someone or the most impactful thing you can do to change the world is to love someone.
Break the chain in your family, your friendships, your marriage, your business, your city, state and country and the world, by simply choosing to love.
Now that is a four-letter word God would use.
Just a Thought…
