True North
+ Dear Lord, open my heart to love you in the spaces that I reserve for myself. Open my heart to my neighbor to love them in the space that we share. “My soul is restless until it finds its rest in you” (St. Augustine). Lord help my soul to recognize that the things that cause me restlessness are areas of invitation to you. Lord open my mind that Your Word may be living and effective giving way to my surrender of heart and soul. Amen.
Exodus 22:20-26 If he cries out to me I will hear him; for I am compassionate
Compassion: to suffer together; the feeling that arises when you are confronted with another’s suffering and feel motivated to relieve that suffering
When you hear the word suffering, what comes to mind? Where this week have you witnessed the suffering of another?
How has your week been? Have you suffered in some way? We must not discount our suffering in light of the suffering that surrounds us. The world is a mess of suffering but we have a Heavenly Father who has the ability, the mercy, and the loving desire to meet each of us in our suffering big or small. God hears our cry, He desires us to direct that cry toward Him.
Psalm 18 I love you, O Lord, my strength, O Lord, my rock, my fortress, my deliverer.
This becomes our prayer in times of suffering. Lord I am struggling with ____________. I love you Lord, my strength, my rock, my deliverer. I hand this suffering to you. Be my strength where I am weak, my rock where I am unsteady, my fortress where I need protection, my deliverer where I need saving. Amen.
1 Thes 5:1-10 For from you the word of the lord is sounding forth.
As I prayed with these scriptures I received a word from the Holy Spirit [Compass]. My heart quickened as it often does when I experience His inspiration. I went to my trusty search engine of Google. Compass is derived from two roots: Com: together (same root as compassion) and Passus: a step or pace.
We are called to be compasses of Christ to others. We are called to live the Word in such a way that we point others to Christ and walk a ways with them on their journey.
Who has recently been a compass for you? What qualities of Christ did they bring to your life? Spend some time praying with the people that the Lord has been repeatedly placing in your life lately. How are you perhaps being called to be a compass to them? We are called to walk this Christian life together one step at a time.
Matthew 22:34-40 Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your strength, with all your mind
What does this look like? Break this down into the individual calls, because they are in fact individual calls. How do we love with our heart? Our strength? Our mind?
Think on people that you have known, or have studied, who exhibit the living reality of this commandment. How do they embody this? What can you learn from them?
Gary Chapman has famously written a number of books on the Five Love Languages. They are: quality time, service, gift giving, words of affirmation, and physical touch. We each have one or two that we gravitate to as our individual love languages. Where do we demonstrate our love to the Lord the greatest from that list? Where are we week? Consider this: Could striving to love the Lord our God in each and every love language help us to better meet this commandment? What does that look like for me?
Matthew 22:34-40 Love your neighbor as yourself
Where in your upcoming week is God calling upon you to fufill this commandment?
Where in your upcoming week will you encounter the suffering of another that with the grace of God you can enter in with compassion?
One last thought, “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” Jesus reaffirms for each of us where our compasses must point. We are not our own true north. God is. And so Holy Spirit ties it all together, [compass].
