Does loving like Jesus ever feel impossible to you? It does to me. I cannot make it through my morning coffee loving God and others the way he has loved me. Does my failure to love perfectly mean that I should question my salvation? No. Rather, I believe Jesus was telling his followers, “Look, I’ve come to show you the best way to live. Life in my kingdom is radically different from the life you have been living. Become a conduit of my grace and engage in true other-centered living.”
from Notes from the Upper Room, The Devotionals
Author: Jason Kanz
I am a neuropsychologist at the Marshfield Clinic and author of Soil of the Divine (2017), Living in the Larger Story: The Christian Psychology of Larry Crabb (2019, editor), and Notes from the Upper Room: Lessons in Loving Like Jesus (2020).
love your enemies
Hear me: Love your enemies, even those who make your blood boil. Let love show up in your actions. Treat others well and do good for them. Bless those who are cursing you and want to see you hurt. Pray for the hearts of abusers. These people will do everything they can to steal your joy. Do not let them. Bring them to me in prayer. Release you negativity and do not give hatred a place in your heart. Bitterness will damage you far more deeply than your enemy ever could.
Luke 6:27-28
Letters to the Beloved
seeking quiet
My Son understood the importance of regularly withdrawing from the people. He would go off on his own to be with me. Learn from his example. Regularly retreating from the busyness and constant stimulation of life is healthy for your soul. It is even more challenging to get away from the hustle and bustle in the industrialized, ever-connected world. You will need to be intentional about finding a quiet place to be with me, just as my Son did.
Luke 5:16, Letters to the Beloved
Living non-offensively
Live non-offensively. I see many of my followers majoring in criticism, sarcasm, and attack. Too many seem to get a charge out of riling up those who believe differently. You can stand boldly for my truth without being a jerk. Instead, seek to do right by others, even those who strongly disagree with you. Do not compromise the truth, but live with kindness and other-centeredness so that others may come to know my Son.
-1 Corinthians 10:32-33
Letters to the Beloved (releases October 25, 2021)
Loving like Jesus
“By this, all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”-John 13:35
John 13:35 is a continuation of verse 34. Francis Schaeffer wrote some of the most remarkable pages about these two verses in The Mark of the Christian (1970). Following Jesus, Schaeffer said that how we carry out Jesus’s commandment is the key criterion by which the world may know what Christianity is all about.
We often assume that people determine the truth of the faith based upon well-reasoned apologetics, culturally relevant messages, or excellent facilities. We stress secondary issues, and we miss the main point.
These other considerations are not unimportant, but they are not ultimate. What if our principal focus was on the reality that every person desires to be loved and accepted?
Jesus told his disciples, “Look…you have seen how I have lived my life. I have loved the unlovable. I have healed the broken. I have crossed cultural lines, even with those most people consider morally deplorable, including some of you. I have sought to serve rather than be served. I want you to do likewise, and when people see my love through you, walls will come down.”
You have been set free
Hear this message, beloved:
I am merciful toward you.
When you fall short of my holy standard,
I forgive you.
When you think or act
inconsistently with what my Spirit whispers,
I still cover you with my lavish grace.
Again, hear this truth;
Meditate on it until you get it.
Because of the new covenant,
enacted by my Son,
perfect priest,
perfect sacrifice,
perfect mediator,
I no longer remember your sins.
Let me repeat it:
I no longer remember your sins.
They are entirely gone.
All those sins you have committed
the ones you think about repeatedly,
listen, they are gone.
When I see you,
I see my Son’s perfection in you.
He has freed you from your chains.
You are no longer a slave;
you have been set free.
Live like it.
Hebrews 8:12, Letters to the Beloved
and it was night
So after receiving the morsel of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night.-John 13:30
Every time I read the phrase, “and it was night,” my skin tingles. It is ominous. It conveys the sense that there is no turning back. John was not merely writing about the setting sun; he was telling his readers that it was the eve of the darkest day in history. Good Friday.
This band of brothers, so closely tied together, was fracturing. Judas had left. Jesus was troubled. The others were confused and fearful as they recalled their interactions with Judas, hunting for clues. They were replaying everything Jesus had said to them, again hoping for hints.
Night is confusion. Night is darkness. Night is fear. In the opening paragraphs of this epistle, John identified Jesus as the light of the world. Light is hope; darkness is hopeless.
You may know the night too. When the doctor calls you personally and says, “It’s cancer,” it is night. When your child, whom you have poured your heart and soul and guts into, has decided that Jesus isn’t her thing, it’s night. When you have gradually saved your money, trying to be a good steward, and you get a call from the IRS saying that they want to go over your most recent tax returns, it’s night.
Darkness comes to everyone. Life is not always how we want it to be. But even in our darkest nights, Jesus is still light.
Jesus, I cannot imagine what you were feeling that night. Were you afraid? Were you angry? Regardless, you did not leave your friends. Help me to remember that even in the darkest times, you are light. Amen.
Letters to the Beloved fun facts
Letters to the Beloved is getting closer to its release date. Just for fun, I thought I would put together some fun facts about the book. Don’t worry, there won’t be a test later.
- Years I have been working on it: Six.
- Pages (7×10): 672
- Words: 266,801
- Paragraphs: 4147
- Footnotes: 408
- HTML color code for the cover: #ffed74
- Most frequently referenced author: C.S. Lewis, who has 7 bibliographic entries, followed by Martin Luther (5).
- Most seemingly out of place reference: Fredrich Nietzsche
- Old Testament Books referenced: 26
- Most frequently referenced Old Testament book: Isaiah, (38); followed closely by Psalms (34).
- Times I have read through it: five
- Hours spent writing and editing: thousands
- Copies I will likely sell: not thousands.
merry-go-round
sometimes
pondering the world
leaves me breathless
and dizzy
verdant immensity
stretches out before me
and a vast sea of blue
holds its place
above my head
planetary
merry-go-round
spinning faster
than any carnival ride
is it any wonder
that I am filled with
butterflies and laughter
as I hang on
for dear life?
self-centeredness has no place in God’s kingdom
“The king turned to those on his left, saying, ‘Get out. You have no place in my kingdom if you want to live self–centered lives. I have watched how you live. You ignore strangers and those who do not fit in. You see people clothed in rags with no way to obtain new clothing, but rather than giving them some of the clothes from your overstuffed closets, you offer them only judgment. You see sick people, and rather than tending to them, you believe that they would be healthy if only they would take care of themselves. And what about the prisoners? You look down on them from your high horse, judging rather than loving them.’ If you do not yet understand what my kingdom is about, you never will. You want to make it all about you—a self–centered, self–glorifying kingdom. Mine is a kingdom built upon love and service. You may believe you have done well, but I see how you have judged and dismissed my image–bearers. If you insist on living in the kingdom of self, I will send you on your way. You can be the mayor of pain and suffering, tormented daily by your self–centeredness. Eternal life is with me, but you won’t get there if you insist on being king.”
Matthew 25:41-46, Letters to the Beloved
Jason Kanz 