JOURNALING: Love Just As Much

My friend and mentor Cynthia Heald got me hooked on a Personal Prayer Journal produced by YWAM Publishing (800 922-2143 and <a href="http://www.ywampublishing.com/default.aspx?">www.ywampublishing.com</a>). This inexpensive resource is yet another tool for reading through the Bible every year and keeping track and focusing on prayer needs I must attend to.

It's the attention it gives to the countries of the world that I particularly like, however, with stories and specific needs to pray for.

As I read about them—their leaders, exact crises they're facing, and the percentage of them who are Christians—they become more real. Even though I've never visited their lands and can't pronounce some of their names, I envision people just like you and me who laugh and cry, get tired and hungry, and most of all who need Jesus more than life itself.

This morning, I read about Pakistan. My first thought was about Osama Bin Laden (if he is still alive) and the Taliban, which hide out and find safe haven in Pakistan. Memories of what they did to our country five years ago flood back to my self-centered mind, as I forget all I just said about people there who need Jesus.

My response reminded me of a similar (though on a smaller scale) demonstration of my ego-centrism many years ago. It involved my children then. In her early teens, one of my kids was hanging out with the wrong crowd. All I could think and pray about was get them away from my child!

One Sunday morning, I sat in church as we prepared to take communion.  Our pastor challenged us to check our hearts for sin (based on 1 Cor. 11:27-28) before we took part in that sacred and important event.  I remember the pew I sat on as I felt God quietly speak to me saying, "I love (and He mentioned three specific names of my daughter's wayward friends) as much as I love Ashley, Courtney, and Clint."

Wow! Did that put me in my place. Those lost girls were inscribed on God's hand (Is. 49:16) just as my children were. Jesus gave His life for the ones in their home just as for those in ours. As for me, I didn't love the ones who were leading my kids astray, and I certainly wasn't praying for them.

With heavenly clarity on this issue, I went home and made a prayer list of not just those three girls, but a total of 77 teens I knew. I began to pray for them all regularly, and I tried to do so with the same fervency as I did my own children.
Shouldn't I do the same for Pakistan today? Aren't the people there just as important to God as the people in my neighborhood and state?

 
Whether it's a country on the other side of the world, or a hard-to-love-and-get-along-with person on the other side of the table, we need to remember God loves them just as much as He loves us. Here in the U.S., we aren't the "teacher's pets," though our full tummies, good incomes, and fine homes cause us to sometimes think we are. Jesus loves the most evil sinners as much as He loves you and me. Perhaps they even occupy a special place in His heart as that's who He spent a lot of time with (Mark 2:15). 

 
Let me challenge you today as I have been challenged. Try filling in your own blank with "God, I know you love ____________ just as much as you love me and mine. And I know you love the people in the country of ______________ just as much as you love us here."

As we do, you and I will be able to step out of our self-centered prayers into the family-of-God prayers. Our us-against-them mentality will be replaced by the mind of Christ—who loved us all and gave Himself for us (Gal. 2:20).

And may God help us to love that way, too.