Faith In The City

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength." Mark 12:30. I have heard this verse repeated more times than I can count, and I would guess a lot of you have too. It gets quoted so often it almost becomes background noise. But repetition was never really my issue with it. My question was always the same one. What does that actually mean? What does it look like in a person's everyday life? Considering how much God brings up love throughout scripture, I started thinking through what loving Him with everything actually requires. It means reading His word. It means being in conversation with Him through prayer. It means worshiping Him. It means cultivating an actual relationship with Him, the same way I would with anyone else I love. The very next verse, Mark 12:31, gives the second half of what Jesus called the greatest commandment. Love your neighbor as yourself. Those two were never meant to live apart from each other. Loving God with everything you have was always connected to how you treat the people around you. So loving God also means loving His people the way He loves us. That means being generous with them. Giving them grace and mercy. Extending forgiveness. Being selfless, even when it costs you something. What it doesn't mean is being perfect or completing a checklist. Our grace, our mercy, our forgiveness were never meant to be based on our own performance. He is not giving us an annual performance review. I still have not figured out why those even work the way they do in the first place. Someone shows up right behind you, watches for a little while, and it basically comes down to whatever they decide to say. That is not how His grace works. Praise be to God for that. If you have spent any time waiting to earn what He already freely gave you, this is your reminder. His love does not run on a scorecard. It renews every single day, whether you had a good day or a hard one. Peace, Love and Joy always. Infinite Faith and Favor | kharisco.com

Matthew 6:33 says to seek His kingdom and His righteousness first, and everything else will be taken care of. It doesn’t mention money, success, power, or even love. Just His kingdom and His righteousness. So what does that actually mean? I was reading this through YouVersion guided scripture, and the narrator, AXIS, asked a question I hadn’t thought about. He asked what “all these things” actually refers to. I assumed it meant His kingdom and righteousness, which led to the real question: what is His kingdom, and what is His righteousness? The answer given was that it means prioritizing the way of being in the world that Jesus modeled. Trusting the Father to generously care for us as we generously care for others. That wasn’t what I would have guessed. This is also why context matters so much when reading scripture. Understanding what was happening before a verse was written changes what it actually means, and sometimes the meaning people assume isn’t the correct one at all. The devotional Seek This First breaks it down further. Instead of worrying about our basic needs, we’re called to seek His kingdom and righteousness first. Worldly things will always fight for our attention. Our schedules fill up, our responsibilities pile on with different levels of urgency, and what we should be seeking instead is the work of the kingdom, which is telling others about the hope of Jesus and teaching what He commanded. Seeking His righteousness means desiring to live the way God intended, according to His word, and making decisions that align with it. That part still feels like a puzzle to me. It’s one thing to say live according to His word. It’s another to actually live it out. And only when we put Him first do the other areas of life make sense. I’ll say this plainly. I don’t fully know if I understand what it means for every area of my life to make sense. Losing my brother still doesn’t make sense to me. But I do believe that once someone fulfills their purpose, their time on earth ends. I think about that a lot when I think about him. I’m in a season of uncertainty and struggle that’s gone on for a long time. I don’t like it. But deep down I know there’s a reason for it, an end to it, and that it’s growing me into something greater. The call to action from the devotional is to think about how you spend your time, and whether you’re worrying about things outside your control. I’m learning this gradually. When I hit a red light while I’m in a rush, my first reaction is still frustration, and then I remind myself I’ll get there when I get there. When my computer is slow and I’m trying to get something done, I get frustrated first, then I ask myself if maybe I’m not supposed to be working on this right now, or what I’m supposed to learn from the delay. I can’t make the computer move faster. I can only decide how I respond to the wait. This isn’t a lesson you learn overnight. It’s one I’m still learning, one red light and one slow loading screen at a time. The devotional also points out that when seeking God becomes your top priority, a desire to tell others about Him naturally overflows. I can testify to that. I’m not out here preaching at people, but I am quicker to talk about what He’s doing, because I genuinely believe everything that happens is for me, not to me. So when something good happens, it’s praise be to God. When someone needs something to go right, it’s let’s pray about this in Jesus’ name. That’s how I share my faith. Not by forcing it, but by living grateful, knowing life isn’t guaranteed, and that I get to live the life I’m living. Peace, Love and Joy always,Tanya / InfiniteFaithandFavor.com

Matthew 22:36-40. Someone asked Jesus which commandment in the entire law was the greatest, and He did not make them wait for the answer. Love God with everything you are. And love the people around you the same way you love yourself. That is it. That is the whole thing.The Bible keeps coming back to this. John 13:35 says people will know we belong to Jesus by how we love one another. 1 Peter 4:8 says love covers a multitude of sins. Over and over, scripture points us back to the same place.Love is the center of what it means to follow Jesus.And one of the hardest ways to live that out is forgiving people who hurt you. I want to be clear that I am not talking about easy forgiveness, the kind that does not cost you anything. I am talking about the kind where you genuinely feel the weight of what someone did and you choose love anyway. That is where the rubber meets the road.I have struggled with that. I will not pretend I have not. Forgiving people who I feel hurt me has been a real challenge. It is less of a challenge than it used to be, and I give God credit for that, but I am not going to stand here and tell you it has been simple.Here is what I think though. If you nail loving people the way God loves you, I think you are golden.Not because you have perfect church attendance. Not because you can recite chapter and verse. Not because your career is impressive or your family looks right from the outside. God is not keeping score on any of that. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is generous. Love does not judge. And if that is not what is coming out of us, none of the other stuff is going to matter the way we think it does.So today, ask God to show you how He wants you to love the people in your life. Ask Him to fill your heart with a deep love for others. Not a love you manufacture on your own, because that runs out. A love He grows in you.That is the assignment.Peace, Love and Joy always, TanyaInfiniteFaithandFavor.com