Ladies and gentlemen, those checking in on Willard, or those looking for new thoughts regarding God's Word, or those eagerly seeking God's face, or maybe you still have motives that are quite unclear even now. Regardless of your reason for opening and pressing play, welcome to the Daily Red Cast. Without love, you cannot be the person God created you to be. God is love.
We're designed in God's image, which means we are to be love as God is love. That's the image we have. In 1 Corinthians 13 verse 1 and 3, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels that have not love, I have become a sounding brass or a clinging symbol. And though I have to give to prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains but I have not love, I am nothing.
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned but I have not love, it profits me nothing. Matthew 5 verse 46 to 48 says, For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same. And if you greet your brethren only, what do you more than others?
Do not even the tax collectors do so. Therefore, you shall be perfect just as your Father and Heaven is perfect. This is in a context where it's talking about loving your enemies, and to be perfect just as God is perfect, who we are created to be. Is those who bless those who we think maybe don't deserve it, not just the ones we think do.
Luke 6 verse 32, but if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you for even sinners? Love those who love them. It's almost being described as it's not really love if you only love those who love you. I mean, it's still love, but how does that make you different?
Transformed. Holy. The greatest of the things that set us apart as children of God, which our faith, hope and love, the greatest is love. And we also know that love never fails.
I mean, God is love. God never fails. Who does God wants to be? 1 Peter 3 verse 8 to 9.
All of you be of one mind having compassion for one another, love as brothers, be tender-hearted, be courteous, not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing. Knowing that you were called to this, you were called to be this. 1 Peter 4 verse 8, above all things have fervent love for one another. For love will cover a multitude of sins.
2 Peter 1 verse 5 to 7. But also for this very reason, giving all diligence add to your faith, virtue, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, perseverance, godliness, to godliness, brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness. Love. 1 John 2 verse 9 to 11.
He who says he is in the light and hates his brother is in darkness until now. He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness and does not know where he is going because of darkness is blind at his eyes. God wants us to be able to see and in order to see.
You have to love. 1 John 3 verse 14 to 15. We know that we have passed from death to life because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death.
Whoever hates his brother is a murderer and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. 1 John 3 verse 18. My little children, let us not love and word or in tone, but indeed and in truth. 1 John 4 verse 7, 8, and 11.
But love and let us love one another for love is of God. And everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. But love and if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
1 John 4 verse 12. No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us and his love has been perfected in us. If he is in 3 verse 14 and 19.
For this reason, I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. That he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might through his spirit in the inner man. That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith that you being rooted and grounded in love. May be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height.
To know the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Even the greatest commandments are to love God with all your heart, soul and mind and strength and also to love your neighbor as yourself. These have been since the beginning of the establishment of the children of God, whatever it was to be a child of God. These were the commandments that were at the center of all of it.
Whether in the law of Moses or in the New Covenant through Christ's blood. Love is foundational. Fundamental and the thing that joins everything. Colossians 3 verse 14 calls it the bond of perfection.
We cannot be who God created us to be without love. Pray for each other, help one another, keep each other accountable and always stay focused on the foot of the cross where all things are level and the love of God and Christ is on full display. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. Stay tuned for more.
The Chronicles of Willard. After graduation, Willard P. Franklin took a job with the city. The position didn't require much talking.
He read water meters, recorded numbers and moved from house to house with a clipboard and a pencil that never left his pocket. Most days, no one answered the door. When they did, Willard was polite, brief and careful. He noticed things other people missed.
Broken steps, sagging porches, windows sealed with plastic, long past winter. He wrote the numbers down exactly as they appeared. He wrote the addresses too. One afternoon, an older woman stopped him as he turned to leave.
They shut my water off last year, she said. I paid what I could. Willard nodded. I'll mark it, he said.
That evening, instead of heading home, Willard went back through his route. He checked his entries twice. Then he filled out a second form. One not required and rarely used.
It listed homes for review, repairs, hardships. Weeks passed, nothing dramatic happened, no speeches, no recognition. But slowly, addresses began disappearing from the shutoff list. Payment plans appeared, repairs were approved, names moved quietly from one column to another.
At the end of the summer, Willard's supervisor called him in. The man held up a stack of forms. You've been filing more of these than anyone else, he said. Why?
Willard thought for a moment. Because the numbers don't tell the whole story, he said. The supervisor looked at him, then nodded. Keep doing it, he said.
Willard left the office and stepped into the afternoon heat. He walked home the long way, passed houses with running water, passed doors that stayed closed, passed windows that caught the light, just right. For the first time, Willard understood that staying quiet had never meant staying small. Make sure you stay tuned for the next installment of the Chronicles of Willard.