From last week
If you love, you overcome. If you do not love, you are overcome. They do not want a Church who will fight to overcome in love. They will try to stop you from loving with all they have because they get in big trouble if they do not prevail.

Everything that comes into your life—both good and bad—is put there as a brick of decision. Will I choose Christ, or will I choose self? If you choose Christ, you will fight for love. If you choose self, then you will fight for self.

Now we are coming into a time and a season in the body of Christ and in America where you really want to walk in love because in love is the strength of grace. In grace is the power to overcome all things. Choosing to love will give you grace, strength, and spiritual virtue. Virtue, in turn, will give you spiritual stamina. God will let you endure many trials in life if you have the noble hunger to know Christ. Why? Because in the trials, He develops love if you will let Him. If you will not, you will not know the deep things of God because love is the only thing that is strong enough to carry them.

In the bosom of love you will find the seed of humility. This is a very high and noble thing in the eyes of God. The Bible says, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” (Amos 3:3) How can you walk with Christ unless you agree with Him? If you do not love with the love of Christ, you are not agreeing with Him. His formative and powerful love will lead you into places you cannot go by yourself. Without love, you will not even recognize them as God's paths.

Love is a force. Do you want to know how to change a man's heart? Love him. Do you want to know how to change a sister's heart? Love her. Do not preach at them. Let your actions of virtue do the talking. Let your actions of humility do the walking, and the message will come home.

About thirty years ago, I went to a service, and the person who was preaching called me out of the audience. He said to me, “I see a clock, and I see a pair of hands that are tearing the clock apart until they have all the parts laid out on the table. Then the hands pick up the clock and start looking at every part.” He exclaimed, “That's what you do with God! You seem to need to understand every part of Him.” I started crying because it was so true. Then he said, “I see another thing about you. You have determined in your heart, for whatever reason, that you are going to learn the love of Christ before you go home to heaven. You are going to learn how to walk in the love of Christ. Because of that, the enemy has asked to sift you to try to stop your ascent in love.” He paused for a moment, and then he said, “But you're going to win. It is because you have really determined to do that.”

So the enemy knows who is really willing to make the choice. But God limits the enemy's intrusion to that for which He has given you the grace to overcome. Nothing can enter into your life that Jesus has not approved. He has to approve it before He will allow it. Most will never make it even halfway up the mountain because they will not take responsibility for their behavior. They always want to blame it on someone else. I hurt when people make those kinds of decisions because no one wins. Most of all, the Lord cannot win.

He says that the most important thing is what—praying in tongues? Being a martyr? He says the most important thing of all is love. Every time that you are challenged by the person or the situation that God has placed in your life, He has done it. Jesus has done it. Is there someone that you do not like in your life? I want you to know that Jesus has placed them there. Is there a circumstance that you do not like in your life? Jesus allowed that to come to you because He wants to build in you the integrity of love. He wants to do that to make you a shining example of Christ in the earth. He wants you to become the glory and the representative beauty of His grace. Isn't that exciting?

Many years ago, my brother went home to be with the Lord at about sixteen years of age. He was in a terrible car accident and was killed instantly. Before he went home to be with the Lord, he had a tumor on the pituitary gland and underwent surgery to remove the tumor. This was many years ago, and at that time, that type of surgery left the patient with many afflictions as side effects of the surgery. The tumor would have to cause so many problems that it would warrant what you would end up with to remove it. So my brother suffered with many maladies as a result of that surgery. For example, in Michigan, where we grew up, it is very hot and humid in the summer. It can be miserable. My brother had no sweat glands, and if the temperature rose above seventy-five degrees, he had to sit in a tub of water. I could go on and on because the effects of this surgery left him in complete physical misery. But Kenny was so kind to everyone. The tumor had caused him to stay very small and also very temperamental. To correct this, he was given hormones so that he would grow. The hormones caused more problems, one of which was obesity. He became obese and tall. People made fun of him all of the time because of his weight. But his kindness would always win them over. When he died, his funeral was the largest funeral in the history of the city of Pontiac. Kenny had loved so completely with such kindness that he had learned Christ.

After he was taken in the automobile accident, I asked the Lord, “Why did You take him so young? We hardly got to know him.” His answer was very simple: “He learned Christ at a very young age.” All of his sufferings had created the image of Christ. Everyone knew it, and everyone loved it.

To be continued next week…

In His Amazing Love,
Nita Johnson