The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, Because the Lord has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives And freedom to prisoners (Isaiah 61:1).
The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert is a book that was recommended to me by my good friend and partner in Chinese radio ministry, Jo Ann Walczak. Jo Ann lived in China for more than a year and taught children there. She is now the producer of our Blogtalk radio show that is in both English and Mandarin, Voice of Hope.
As Jo Ann and I prayed about where God would lead us in upcoming shows, He made it more and more clear to us to share on love. And that’s why she brought up this book by Rosaria Butterfield—she said it was a great read and Rosaria shares how people did not keep telling her about the gospel, but loved her over and over again. She even said that if people would have kept telling her how to be saved and pushed her on that, she’d have never been born again. Rosaria was a lesbian and taught at a large university. Yet she didn’t ask that the Bible be proven to her, what spoke to Rosaria was the love shown to her by Christians.
I’ve been saved since the womb I think (not true, but feels that way), so I oftentimes wonder what a person who doesn’t know Jesus thinks about? How does he or she feel or process what we say when we share the gospel?
Love. They need to feel love. Matthew 24:12 says, “Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold.” Times will be difficult. Families will divide, two against three and three against two. Some Christians, even the elect, will fall away and “men’s hearts will fail them because of fear.” That does not sound like good news to me. So how do we share good news in the era of COLD HEARTS? We love them. “They’ll know we are Christians by our love.”
How do we love the lost? I don’t know. I think love has many different approaches and nuances. Love meets needs. Love gives and serves. But most of all, the purest expression of love comes from a person who is connected to and in conversation with the God of love. Am I connected to God today? Are we talking right now, checking in with one another? Do I look heavenward and ask God, “What’s next? How can I help you? What can I do for you right now?”
God is love. That’s it.
And as far as our Blogtalk radio show, Voice of Hope? Well, we’ve laid quite a foundation of scripture since our launch date 11/11/11! We’ve read over the internet radio the books of John, Acts, and Ephesians from the Bible and now we’re recording Romans, too, in both English and Mandarin. We’ve done a number of music shows and broadcast a commentary on Ephesians. It’s exciting to work for the king! But love . . . Jesus loves the Chinese people. Jesus loves ALL the people of the world.
Love is a force. Love is something you do on purpose. Love shakes off offenses and forgives. Love clings to truth or it is not God’s love. Love . . . Father in heaven, help us all to love you and to love the person in front of today. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Free Downloads!
Listen to the Gospel of John read in English and Mandarin on Voice of Hope Blog Talk Radio. Listen to the Book of Acts, Romans, and Ephesians read in English and Mandarin from Voice of Hope Blog Talk Radio.
Listen to the Voice of Hope Music shows from Voice of Hope Blog Talk Radio. 
Hope, I am just reading this book now! I was thinking of writing a review as well on my blog. It’s powerful stuff. Jo
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Hope, I saw the title of your blog and was struck that we were reading the same book. .. then I read the piece. Thank you for mentioning me. The blog is a wonderful compilation on the need to pursue love and the use of our show to do it. Thank you. May I copy this as a guest blog on my blog? It will broaden my blog audience… that was one pointer I picked up at the conference … use guest bloggers. By the way, you are welcome to use any of mine… see this week’s on “name.” http://www.joannjoneswalczak.blogspot.com Let me know if I can use it. Thanks, Jo Ann
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Jo Ann, please do use this on your guest blog! Even with all the evangelists throwing out the fish nets this year, each one of us needs to know our grace, our gift, our talent in throwing out the fish net to reach our loved ones. Word of mouth is the best way to inspire people on anything, including the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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Hi Hope. While reading this I was reminded of two things. And now a third… haha. 1st. The book I borrowed from a friend by Leif Hetland – “Seeing Through Heaven’s Eyes”, then also Heidi Baker’s “Compelled by Love”; both great books on loving the one in front of you. But all through the reading was the reminder that Love is tangible, just like Peace and Grace – all a portion of Him that we can release. 🙂
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Sweet thoughts, Regina. The gospel in a word is “love.” That’s why I also believe that we can look at all that is provided through Billy Graham’s new Hope for America, and Greg Laurie’s Hope for Hurting Hearts, and Reinhard Bonnke and Daniel Kolenda’s new crusades in AMerica, and ask God if we should labor together with one of these people or if he has a different sort of net for us to cast into the water. So many people in the Valley of Decision. And they need that tangible love you’re talking about. Makes me want to shout, “Lift up the cross!”
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Hi, Hope,
Like Jo Ann I taught children English, mostly 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders, in China for two years. I went home between the two years and on the return flight I had a delightful time with the other person in the row, a Chinese lady named Miriam from Singapore. She was returning home after visiting her daughter in San Francisco. She became a Christian when she was thirty, but one of the greatest influences on her was the love missionaries showed her at the end of the war when she was nine. She told me to just love the kids and they knew that I did. That was nearly 20 years ago and I still miss them.
Too many people don’t realize that love is an action verb, not an emotion. It’s how we treat others, not how we feel about them.
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Wow, thanks for sharing that, David. It seems China’s children have impacted a number of us who gather on this blog. And if not China’s children, then “all the children of the world–red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in His sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world!” But Miriam’s testimony is the same as Rosaria Butterfield’s testimony (explained above). Each woman was impacted first by the love. Love is visual–seen on the face of the person speaking to us. Love is felt–demonstrated by the actions of the person giving to us. Love is heard–demonstrating by the person in front of us taking time to listen when we need an ear. I believe that love is most fully demonstrated when a person stops whatever they are doing and gives you their full attention. That’s “stopping for the one” that Heidi Baker talks about. That is paying attention to what makes God happy–loving Him and loving people.
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