1 Corinthians 13:13 tells us that faith, hope, and love remain; but the greatest of these is love. So how can we learn to truly walk in love?
Jo welcomes author Paul Miller, and we explore his latest book . Drawing from the book of Ruth, we learn how to embrace relationships around us, endure rejection, cultivate community, and reach out to even the most unlovable people around us.
Paul offers a tremendous insight on our attitude toward gaining community and intimacy, and it’s one that applies from middle school deep into adulthood:
“We’re hunting for a relationship where we can feel good, and that quest is – I’ll use a big, fancy word – idolatrous. Because it’s putting love as the quest itself. It’s an impossible quest. You’ll never find community and intimacy. You’ll end up alone.
And let me just give a quick example of what this looks like for any of us. If you come into a room of strangers, our first thought is, “Who do I know here?” “How can I be included?” “Does anybody like me here?”
We don’t even ask these questions. They’re just there. They’re shaping how we come into the room. Now none of these questions are wrong, but the dominance of them tends to skew us. And I would call it the “the Jesus question” is: “Who’s alone?” “Who’s left out?” “Can I help them be included?”
And what that does then, is that then I’m going to the outsider, and I’m creating community through love. So love then, where I go through these little deaths, ends up creating community as opposed to what people are trying to do in creating community directly.”
It’s a powerful discussion on the importance of love – on this latest Connecting Faith.
