Chosen

So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. (Colossians 3:12-13)

I heard a story one time. Not sure if it really happened or not.. Two brothers were playing together. The oldest brother was adopted, the younger wasn't. As brothers often do, they started to argue. Out of meanness, the younger brother said "Mom and Dad love me more than you! I'm really theirs, but you're adopted!". The older brother shot back "No they love me more! They have to love you, but they chose to love me!".

Just think, God didn't have to love us, but He did. In fact, He chose us to be His very own. And just as a loving parent.. He see His children through eyes of love, cheering their achievements, ignoring their flaws. God sees us as "holy and beloved", even though we're often our own worst critic.

Since God's so forgiving and so loving with us, how can we possibly be unforgiving toward others?

Power of Love

In all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
(Romans 8:37-39)

Notice it doesn't say we overwhelmingly conquer by doing good works, or by our faith. We overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loves us! His love is constant, powerful, deeper than the deepest ocean, higher than the heavens.. By abiding in His love, we not only conquer, we "overwhelming conquer". If we were playing a baseball game, the score would be 99 to 0! Having God on our team assures us of victory in life. That doesn't mean we'll never have problems, but it does mean He will always love us.

And as long as we abide in His love, we're winners from His perspective. To give an analogy, think about your children. You don't always love everything they do but- you can't help but love them. And the cool thing is- nothing can separate us from God's love. Whether we live or die, there's no angel, no evil, nothing that's happening now and nothing that's ever going to happen, nothing can ever separate us from His love!