Love Always Hopes

 

"Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 

It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres."

1 Corinthians 13:6-7 (NIV)

"Can a mother forget the baby at her breast

and have no compassion on the child she has borne?

Though she may forget, I will not forget you.

See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;

your walls are ever before me."

Isaiah 49:15-16

“Hope means hoping when things are hopeless, or it is no virtue at all.

As long as matters are really hopeful, hope is mere flattery or platitude; 

it is only when everything is hopeless that hope begins to be a strength.”

GK Chesterton

Lately, God has been showing me just how insidious how an unloving, unforgiving heart can really be. I think we often assume that an unforgiving and unloving heart must be actively bitter- at the forefront of one's mind. While that is certainly often the case, I wonder if this kind of thing more often flies under the radar in the form of mild annoyance, lowered expectations, and subtle avoidance. Maybe a lack of love and forgiveness looks more like a lack of involvement than like hostility. Perhaps that's why Scripture tells us that God disciplines those whom He loves. He has enough hope for the kinds of people that He can transform us into that He doesn't give up or shy away from extreme measures. He has been showing me how often I don't exhibit this kind of loving persistence- passing off my dismissal of others as acceptance and my unwillingness to challenge others and myself as patience.

Is there anyone in your life who you've lost hope for in subtle ways? What would it look like to embrace the reality found in Jesus that love always hopes?

Release

A group of professional African drummers and dancers teaching a dance to 
audience members.

One of the goals FOCUS has begun to pursue more is to more effectively welcome all kinds of people into our community. UTD is one of the most diverse college campuses in the country, but (like in most places), people tend to cluster into groups that look the same and think the same. It can be easy to reach out to students who look like me, invite them to a service where the pastors all look like me where they can sing music made by people who look like me and listen to me quote theologians who look like me in my sermon. While diversity for its own sake may not be the main goal of ministry, the call of God's people is to be a blessing to all nations, and often we assume this will happen with no effort or thought on our part. Some of our pastors and students recently put on an event called RELEASE that celebrated African American and native African art- much of which is Christian. It was a way to communicate to a large section of the campus that the community we offer is for them, too. That we want God's fingerprints to be on everyone at our campus, and we want our community to look more and more like the multitude of every tribe and nation that God revealed to John in Revelation. 

But beyond the seriousness of these goals, it was a beautiful event, and some of the most fun I've had in a long time!

The show ended with a New Orleans style second line chorus. It was one of
the most joyful things I've seen happen on any college campus.

Prayer

• The last week of March is Spring Outreach Week- a time where a group of students from another college ministry in Washington state called Campus Christian Fellowship joins up with our students to reach students across campus- connecting them with Christians, bringing them into Christian community, and sharing the message of Jesus with them. Please be praying that God work work through this!
• There are still a lot of students and staff members in FOCUS who are going through a really hard time with crises and tragedies in their own lives and in the lives of family and friends. Please be praying for comfort, peace, and strength for them- both through God's people and directly through His Spirit and provision.