Pause

Love enters the world of its own accord, for its own reasons. And love is always accompanied by light. That is, love always illuminates the space it occupies.

Watch now for love to enlighten your world. Look to see what new understanding is yours in the presence of love.

Listen

You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father.

John 15:14-15

Think

Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love God; the next one is to love our neighbor as ourselves.

He also said that the ultimate act of love and friendship is to lay down your life for a friend.

Jesus did all of these things. He loved God, he loved his neighbor, and he laid down his life for each of us. Jesus’ entire life and death was an act of friendship to us. It was through his teachings and the way he lived his life that Jesus made God known to each of us. As we strive to live as Jesus did, we return Jesus’ acts of friendship and are drawn closer to the heart of God.

Nikki Hardeman

Pray

God, thank you for teaching us what true friendship looks like. Continue to guide me in my friendships with others, so that I may be the kind of friend you have taught me to be. Amen.

Go

As a friend of God,
Go now with the gift of love.
Be prepared to receive joy,
For joy is love's result.
And be set free in your faith,
A faith that does not burden you,
But frees you also to love.