When you tell another person that you will do something for them, especially when you say the words “I promise”, you are committing yourself to doing that thing at any cost. To love your neighbour means to keep your promise.
A good neighbor keeps a promise because no one likes to be disappointed. Or would you like to see your friends not show up for your birthday or a visit after they had promised they would? Or how about not meeting your friend at home when they had promised they would be home?
A promise is a strong commitment and shouldn’t be taken lightly. Even the bible cautions us not to make promises we can’t keep. Jesus said that we should stand by what we say. If it is a “yes” we should stand by it. And if it is a “No” we should allow it to be a strong one and not change our minds. This is also a way to love your neighbour.
Matthew 5:37 (KJV) But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.
Your neighbor could be counting on you for help with something. It could be helping a classmate at school with some school work. Or helping a friend with some money. And you could be their only hope at doing or getting something. If you end up doing otherwise it could damage your friendship with them. It could also make people to label you as a bad and not trustworthy fellow. This indeed is not a way to love your neighbour.
Again, you only treat people as you would want them to treat you. Remember, no one likes to be disappointed.
May the Lord help you to make promises you can keep. May He also help you not make promises that you can’t or wouldn’t keep. Amen.
Prayer: Lord, give me the grace to not make empty promises. Empower me to make good my promises. Help me to obey the “love your neighbour” commandment. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Action point: Before you commit yourself to help someone, pray and let the Holy Spirit lead you.
Husbands are to appreciatetheir wives, while the wives are to praise their husbands. That’s the magic.
I will dedicate the aspect of ‘wives praising their husbands’ to all husbands and fathers. To mark our father’s day celebration. The day is for fathers’ so let’s focus on how to make them happy and feel good because that’s the essence of marriage.
I believe this is in order. Then the aspect of ‘husbands appreciating their wives’ will come up tomorrow.
The two words appreciate and praise have same elements but are slightly different. We just concluded celebrating our fathers and by extension our husbands. It feels good to know that at least a day is set aside to shower encomium on our fathers and husbands.
Every wife should know how to praise her husband. If you wait till your husband is perfect, you will wait a long time. Besides, who says you have the right standard to judge him? You may have a thousand things against him, look for and focus on the good things he has done.
How he has been faithful? How he has been a good father to your children? He didn’t neglect you when you were pregnant, he didn’t abuse you, he provided for you, he prayed and fast for you.
The truth is that your husband has done so much for you, that you are not even aware of. It will take eternity to discover some of the things our husbands have done for us. Just like it will be in eternity to unravel the so many things our heavenly father has done for us.
Sometimes we have misjudged their motives, yet God is the judge of all and He looks into the heart.
God our heavenly father loves praises and men are created in the image of God, so there is a part of every man that craves praises.
If every wife will look beyond the pains and hurts and just praise your husbands for what they do, I believe that praise will work wonders.
But when Herod’s birthday came, the daughter of Herodias danced in the midst [before the company] and pleased and fascinated Herod, And so he promised with an oath to give her whatever she might ask. Matthew 14:6 – 7 AMPC
That is what praise can do. We can learn this principle from this young girl, who despite who King Herod was or whatever he had done, danced with all her heart, honored him till he felt so wonderful.
She could access what the king had by simply honoring him. She brought herself to a place of prominent to forgetting herself and praising the king first. She was rewarded for it.
Let us all as wives focus on praising our husbands. Let us be selfless. Let us not be too mindful of ourselves.
We can’t dance unless we learn to forget whatever issues, grievances we had towards our husbands. For us to dance in a way that pleases and catch the attention of our husbands, our hearts must be free of offences.
Have a light heart. So you can dance well. All you want is for your king to open his mouth and give you half of his kingdom, his heart, his life, his commitment, his loyalty, his attention.
The principle is do his own first.
May God grant us the heart of humility to rid our hearts of everything that will not make our hearts light, so that we can dance for him.
God bless our marriage
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I will honour my husband and king
PRAYERS FOR THE DAY Father, teach me how to honor my husband.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life (Proverbs 31:11-12 KJV)
ACTION PLAN FOR THE DAY Praise your husband today.
Tunrayo borrowed Lola’s Geography notebook from school to copy the new lesson into her own notebook. She flung the notebook into her bag and pushed the bag aside to the wall. When it was time to leave for home, Tunrayo stuffed her books and pen into her bag, crushing all the items in it, before zipping it right. The next day at day, when she returned Lola’s book, it was not like it was before. The edges were bent, there was oil stains and water marks all over it. (Does this portray “love your neighbour”?)
‘Tunrayo, what happened to my book?’ a shocked Lola asked.
You see, Tunrayo didn’t know that she was destroying Lola’s book with the way she was handling it. And she returned it not the way she borrowed it from Lola.
Let’s see what God has to say about this in the bible, in line with love your neighbour as yourself.
“A man might borrow an animal from his neighbor. It might get hurt or die while the owner is not there. Then the one who borrowed it must pay the owner for the animal. Exodus 22:14 ICB
Well, in this case, it’s a notebook that was borrowed. Yes, Fikayo gave it back but it wasn’t the way she had borrowed it.
The thing is, would you like to receive your belongings back in a rough, torn or dirty way? If no, then why would you want to do that to someone?
Remember, loving your neighbor is a sign of how much you love yourself and how well you want to be treated. If you want to be treated well by others, treat other people well too. If you love yourself well, you will love others too; you will love your neighbour as yourself.
What should Fikayo had done with Lola’s notebook? She should have handled it with care and ensured she returned it as she had received it. Even better than she had. That would have made Lola happy and ensured that she lend more of her books to Fikayo. But with what Fikayo did with the book, Lola might likely never borrow her anything ever again.
May you receive the grace to be a good neighbour. Amen.
Prayer: Lord, make me a good neighbour. Help me to love your neighbour in Jesus’ name, amen.
Prayer point: What have you borrowed from people? Did you return them in a good condition? Or a bad one?
Today we will be learning how to love your neighbour as yourself from the story of Tom.
Tom glanced outside of the window, away from his video game, and noticed the dark clouds signaling rain any moment now. He returned to his game till it began to rain. It rained for hours. Remember the story is about ‘love your neighbour as yourself.’
Later that day, Fikayo, Tom’s roommate returned from class and found his clothes drenched on the line. He knew Tom had seen him this morning when he was washing. Why hadn’t Tom helped him to pack his clothes off the line before it rained? Did Tom not learn “love your neighbour as yourself”?
“Tom, why didn’t you help me to pack my clothes when it began to rain?’ asked Fikayo. ‘I don’t know.’ Tom replied.
Fikayo shook his head sadly and left Tom to his video game. “You must learn to love your neighbour as yourself,” he thought as he left.
In the bible, God laid down some instructions to the Israelites concerning this “love your neighbour as yourself” matter.
You might see your fellow Israelite’s ox or sheep wandering away. Don’t ignore it. Take it back to its owner. The owner might not live close to you. Or you might not know who he is. Then take the animal home with you. Keep it until the owner comes looking for it. Then give it back to him. Deuteronomy 22:1 – 2 ICB
He says that it is a sin if you act nonchalantly towards your neighbor’s belongings. Not that you should be on the lookout for their things. No. What it means is that, when you are in a position to help keep their things safe, you should do so. Love your neighbour as yourself.
Just like Tom in our story. He knew it was going to rain and he didn’t help his roommate – his neighbor, to pack his clothes in. Even if Fikayo was not his roommate, but because he saw him washing and Tom was around when it began to rain. He should have portrayed “love your neighbour as yourself.”
All he could have done was to take some minutes to demonstrate how much he loves his neighbor by helping to pack his clothes from the line. Learn to love your neighbour as yourself.
God isn’t saying that you should love your neighbour as yourself because they are good, but because He wants you to grow to a point where you can love people irrespective of who they are or what they do to you.
May God bless you and give you a heart of love for people. Amen
Prayer: Lord, help me to act responsibly towards people’s things around me, in Jesus’ name, amen.
Action point: Be watchful of people’s thing’s around you; love your neighbour as yourself
I want to show you some things this morning from God’s word. By taking heed to these things, you can appropriate all necessary to make God answer your prayers and prepare yourself for an exuberantly beautiful love life.
The ways of God are not our ways! In fact, the ways we think and process things are far different from the way God thinks and processes things. The challenge is that our success in relationship, marriage, and life is the degree to which our thoughts and ways are aligned to God’s ways and thoughts!
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9 KJV)
When a man begins to think like God, it is the beginning of incredible success and astounding victories in life. No wonder the Bible says, we have the mind of Christ.
So here are few things, though not exhaustive, that you need to take heed to in your bid to maximize your relationship with God and to get aligned to the ways and thoughts of God. This will help improve your love life significantly.
1. Your relationship with God This comes top on the list. It is the first order of things. Without this, you cannot really go far in God! There has to be a relationship with God before your relationship or marriage can work the way God wants it to. It is this relationship with God that fraternizes you with the thoughts and the ways of God. Have you consciously accepted Jesus into your life? That is the beginning of success in your relationship and marriage! There are no two ways to it!
2. Your love for God Then, of course, your love for God is important. It is your love for Him that propels you and fuels you to go after Him! Your love for God should be reciprocal to His love for you because He actually loves you first!
As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. (Psalms 42:1 KJV)
3. The motive of your love You don’t develop a relationship with God because of what you want Him to do for you or what you want to get from Him, you develop a relationship with Him because you love Him! You need to get this! God does not look at actions first; He looks into the heart. He goes to the deepest intricacies of your heart and locates the motive for every action. Nobody can fool God; nobody can succeed at fooling God.
4. Your love for His word Your love for God drives you into His word. As you search His word, it fuels your love for Him the more. It is like an endless cycle of knowing God more through His word. As you know more of His word, you begin to know how He thinks and how He acts.
5. Your obedience to His word As you become a student of the word, He will begin to show you a lot of things. When you make up your mind to obey in pragmatic ways, you begin to learn His ways. It is in stepping out on His instructions that you start learning what works and what doesn’t work with God.
But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. (Hebrews 5:14 KJV)
6. Your refrain from iniquity Your decision to stay away from any wrong has a long way to go in determining your answers to prayers. There is no way you can get anything from God if you are habitually stuck in something you know God does not want. The life of God that you have in you will not make you comfortable in habitual sin. It is one thing to make a mistake; it is another thing to be living habitually in sin.
Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world (1 John 2:15-16 KJV)
7. Your disconnection from the old One of the reasons our prayers are not being answered is because we hold on to the old ways of doing things and old ways of thinking. But in order to move forward, we have to disconnect from mindsets and established routines as a result of our experiences in the past. You cannot use your experience to conclude on the ways of God. That one particular prayer point was not answered for eleven years does not mean you cannot get the next prayer answered in a few days!
Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old. (Isaiah 43:18 KJV)
8. Your acceptance of the new Your ability to think out of the box, to think beyond the norms, and to not box God will go a long way in determining your success in the things of God.
Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19 KJV)
God is about to make a way. It is different from the ways you know. You must be willing to believe and accept that which God wants to do in your life, and He will be able to do it. That is faith.
9. Your confessions and utterances Your words and utterances must be aligned to God’s word in your heart. Your mouth becomes your might in the things of the Spirit. You cannot be saying you believe something and yet your utterances contradict your supposed disposition. In the things of God, your confession is a profession; it is work because it is working out something!
Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) (Hebrews 10:23 KJV)
10. Your associations and covering Lastly, disconnect from all ungodly associations. Do away from people that suffocate your faith and inject fear into you instead. Surround yourself with encouragers and people that lift your spirit with God’s word. Get somebody over your life to serve as a spiritual covering.
May God grant you more understanding.
CONFESSION FOR THE DAY I prioritize my walk with God so my love life does not suffer
PRAYER FOR THE DAY Ask for wisdom to balance your love life
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert. (Isaiah 43:19 KJV)
ACTION PLAN FOR THE DAY Is your love life under attack? Talk to your mentor
