Set Free to Love Deeply

REFLECTION QUOTES

“We like to make a distinction between our private and public lives and say, ‘Whatever I do in my private life is nobody else’s business.’ But anyone trying to live a spiritual life will soon discover that the most personal is the most universal, the most hidden is the most public, and the most solitary is the most communal. What we live in the most intimate places of our beings is not just for us but for all people. That is why our inner lives are lives for others. That is why our solitude is a gift to our community, and that is why our most secret thoughts affect our common life.”

~Henri Nouwen (1932-1996), Catholic priest, professor and writer

“What we are called to, and what in the resurrection we are equipped for, is a knowing in which we are involved as subjects but as self-giving, not as self-seeking, subjects: in other words, a knowing that is a form of love.”

~N.T. Wright (1948-present), British New Testament scholar and retired Anglican bishop

“Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.”

~Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), Austrian neurologist, father of psychoanalysis

“When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.”

~Ralph Ellison (1914-1994), American novelist, literary critic, and scholar

“The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because generally they are the same people.”

~G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936), English writer, lay theologian and Christian apologist

“Love calls you to be silent when you want to speak, and to speak when you would like to be silent. Love calls you to act when you would really like to wait, and to wait when you would really like to act. Love calls you to stop when you really want to continue and it calls you to continue when you feel like stopping. Love requires you to lead when you really would like to follow, and to follow when you really want to lead. Love again and again calls you away from your instincts and your comfort. Love always requires personal sacrifice. Love calls you to give up your life.”

~Paul David Tripp (1950-present), American pastor, author and speaker

SERMON PASSAGE

1 Peter 1:22-2:3

22 Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart, 23 for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. 24 For,

“All flesh is like grass
And all its glory like the flower of the grass.
The grass withers,
And the flower falls off,
25 But the word of the Lord endures forever.”

And this is the word which was preached to you.

Chapter 2

1 Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, 2 like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, 3 if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord.