A Day-by-day devotional

February 10, 2023

Choose love

Chronological One Year Bible Reading Plan: Psalm 113-118

Scripture of the Day: Luke 14:15-24

Going to a bar doesn’t necessarily make you a drunk. Visiting someone in prison won’t make you a prisoner. Exploring a Buddhist temple wouldn’t certainly turn you into a follower. That goes without saying, that attending a Christian church every Sunday does not make one a Christian.

Associating one‘s self with something would not and does not necessarily make you become that something. Sitting on a bookshelf won’t make you a book. What it could do though, is to enable you to get to feel like a book stashed on a bookshelf. Is the shelf too high? Too low? Does it feel too compact and narrow that you cannot feel a significant amount of air passing through? How is it like to be browsed through only at the covers and be immediately put back on the shelf thereafter? Do you count that as being judged? Is it fulfilling when someone picks you up and reads you from the first page to the last? You have given much, poured out much, even bled out entirely what you have. Do you feel exposed? Abused? Or are you gathering up a lot of dust and feel useless?

You may get to know and experience all those – the triumphs, the struggles, the joys and the pains of a book. By sitting on the shelf, you get to learn what it is like to be a book, live the life of a book. You, however, are still not a book.

Association does not magically result to you becoming what you’re associated with. But you get to learn about them and feel them out. The problem is, very few would like to cross that line. If I wouldn’t want to become, why would I be associated? What good would that do me?

If you are a person who tries to live a righteous way of life, you would probably not want to be seen frequenting a pub. Likewise, you might be very uncomfortable to even just get near the entrance of a Hindu temple. You wouldn’t want to be associated with the “wrong“ place, the “wrong“ crowd, the “wrong“ friends, or the “wrong“ people.

When we love someone, we also tend to learn to love those that they love. I have a number of friends that I got to be friends with, and with time, gradually got to know their families, and those whom they love. With one of my friends, for instance, I was able to say after a while since we first became friends and I got to know and became close to his parents as well, talking about how I care about his parents, “In the beginning I loved them because of you, but now, I love them because of them.“

Jesus was seen eating with tax collectors and others whom the Pharisees called as sinners (Matthew 9:10-13). Jesus associated Himself with the outcast of society. He feasted with them, talked to them, even befriended them. Still, however deep the association, He never turned into becoming one of them. He was with them and loved them, but their misdeeds did not influence Him. He influenced them. He altered their hearts. He changed their lives.

Therefore, let us not be afraid to be associated with the “wrong“ place, the “wrong“ crowd, the “wrong“ friends, or the “wrong“ people. Instead, let us go our way to bring them the same love which we know Jesus gave us.

Let us love other people because of Jesus, and in the process, we would learn to love them too, because of them.

Choose to be different. Choose to be bold. Choose love.

Reflection: Are you ready to choose?

Prayer: Jesus, you have loved me just as I am. May I not hold back loving others just as they are too. In doing so, may I show them your love, and influence as well as inspire them to turn to you. Amen.