{"id":4580,"date":"2019-07-01T03:10:34","date_gmt":"2019-07-01T03:10:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/?p=4580"},"modified":"2019-07-01T03:10:34","modified_gmt":"2019-07-01T03:10:34","slug":"do-you-love-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/?p=4580","title":{"rendered":"Do you love life?\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">I am not asking if you love God, but something different. Do you truly love to be alive? Peter lets us know that there is a pathway to \u201cloving life.\u201d Jesus also said that He came to give us abundant life, not just eternal life.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Greek word for <i>abundant <\/i>in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bibleserver.com\/text\/ESV\/John10%3A10\" class=\"bibleserver extern\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">John 10:10<\/a> is \u201cperissos\u201d which means &#8220;superabundant (in quantity) or superior (in quality); excessive; advantage; exceedingly; very highly; and beyond measure.&#8221; If we combine any of these words with \u201clife,\u201d we realize we have been promised something wonderful for living now.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>One main way to grow in loving life is to focus on working with God instead of for God<\/b>. <!--more-->This perspective will help us be child-like, which will enable us to see life as full of possibilities, adventure and opportunities (because we are friends with a good and big God). Those with a \u201cworking for God\u201d mindset can find it difficult to love life to its fullest because of a fear of displeasing God and being ultimately punished for not measuring up.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cWorking with God\u201d can be easier with our strengths than with our failures because we wrongly believe we must \u201cget our act together\u201d before reconnecting with God. This mistaken thinking is at the root of why many Christians don\u2019t \u201clove life.\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bibleserver.com\/text\/ESV\/Hebrews4%3A15-16\" class=\"bibleserver extern\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Hebrews 4:15- 16<\/a> is an antidote to this error and an igniter to loving life. \u201cFor we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses . . . Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace . . . and find grace to help in time of need.\u201d<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Even in our weaknesses, the Father delights in giving grace, so we can experience the abundant life. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><i> <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Extract from Victorious Mindsets Steve Backlund<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I am not asking if you love God, but something different. Do you truly love to be alive? Peter lets us know that there is a pathway to \u201cloving life.\u201d [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,51,45,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","category-identity","category-mindset","category-witness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4580"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4581,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4580\/revisions\/4581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cassowary.unitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}