COLOSSIANS 3:12

Since God chose you to be the holy people he loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. (NLT)

TO PONDER:

Today we had the first day of the relaunch of Westside Mainly Music, after we had the help of the fabulous Oliver to fix the technical issues we were experiencing, it was important I was there early to set up everything in case there were any new issues to be discovered so we had time to fix them.

After packing the computer, cables and required dongles the night before I was confident everything would run smoothly, right up until I had to clothe myself with the Manly Music shirt, which is the required “uniform” for Mainly Music and I couldn’t find it.

Today’s Verse is part of a section of Paul’s letter written to the church in Colossae, where he provides them with a “Cheat Sheet”, a template, a formula for a John 10:10 existence (an overflowing life) as God’s church.

Now, as a church planter/pastor for a lot of years now, I would probably say things like read your Bible daily and pray everyday, don’t miss worship on Sunday, and that’s just a few of the practices to start with but Paul doesn’t even give a nod to these spiritual practices. 

He instead leads with a list of woke, touchy-feely, emotional, unquantifiable metrics; tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience and then he takes it too far when he commands us to forgive anyone who offends us!

And Paul, I’m in a hurry and I really don’t have time to even find where I left the agape love t-shirt you are asking me to outfit myself with, “above all”…

The formula to a John 10:10 overflowing life is summed up with forgiveness and love.

PRAYER: Forgiving God, I thank you for loving me first, for forgiving me when I didn’t deserve it or even asked for it, help me love others as you have loved me, to be quick to forgive and show your grace to others. Amen.

Today's devotion written by Danny Brock, LifeWay Westside