The Greatest of these is Love

I’m finishing up a series with my students, “I’m a Christian, now what?” Basically I’m talking to them about what we can be doing as Christians and what the first steps are.

I’m sharing with them some stories of Biblical heroes that did amazing things, and how we can start doing those things, but then sharing with theme some very real, practical first steps. We have talked about baptism, worship, prayer, and reading the Word over the past few weeks. Tonight we talked about the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

I talked about how before Jesus, God’s Spirit was with a very limited group of people, but after Jesus went to heaven He sent the Spirit to all God’s people. I illustrated some of the people in the Old Testament, and then I talked about Peter, who was full of fear and doubt and … well himself. Then the change that came over him when the Spirit came upon him in power.

Then I talked about out own lives and how we can live this life of power too. I also talked about how it can be so much more. Paul talks in 1 Corinthians 13 about the greater gifts of the Spirit. “These three remain, Faith, Hope, and Love, but the greatest of these is Love.” This doesn’t mean that God’s Spirit doesn’t empower us to do miracles, but it does mean that the greatest miracle that the Spirit gives us the power to do is the ability to love our enemies, the ones who hurt us and keep on hurting us.

Then we had a time at the altar that was beyond amazing. I honestly don’t have words to describe what God did.