Bless and Be Blessed

I was reading from 1 Peter 3 last night as my night reading of scripture. I think these two verses are quite challenging, more so the second verse:

1 Peter 3:8-9 NIV
"Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble. [9] Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing."

The first verse, is easy to read, difficult to live out. Peter is challenging us to live in such a way that we consider others, look at their situations, love them, have compassion on them, and work to understand how they think and what they think. Again, it all sounds nice, until we try to live that way. Our society (America} is very self-focused. We value our independence, we value our freedom to be the person we want to be, we love the fact that we can pursue the American dream. In this culture our focus is on ourselves, what we want, like and need.

Peter calls us to a selfless, other focused lifestyle. We are called to lay down our own thinking, our own opinions, our own requirements and be like-minded with our brothers and sisters in the Church. The Greek word means literally having one mind, one perception, one way of thinking. We are encouraged to be sympathetic, in other words to understand and actually feel or experience someone else's situation. This is far beyond just acknowledging their situation, but requires experiencing the same. We are called to have compassion and love one another. The word for compassion means a deep stirring in ones bowels, deep down, life changing, action altering compassion. We are called to stop and really see each other - Heidi Baker preaches about stopping for the one. I know I am so quick to walk past people and never really see them. We touch and operate on the surface, but we are called to go deep.

Finally, verse 9 is one I don't even like to read, let alone live out. It just goes against my natural inclination to defend myself, to resist and stand-up against that which is evil or those who would insult me. There is some deep call here, that we don't usually grasp, and that is the fact that this is how Jesus lived. His life says this is possible, and this is the heart of God, for Jesus came as an exact representation of God (Heb 1:3). As Bill Johnson says, "Jesus is perfect theology!". Living as representatives of the Lord, means we must learn to live like this as well. Jesus blessed those who killed Him. He paid for ALL sinners with His own blood. He opened the door to relationship with God for ALL men, regardless of whether they are good or evil, sinners or saints.

Peter says we were ALL called to this, so its not an optional extra, or something we can let someone else do. There is a blessing that is available to us when we do this - blessing those that insult us, or do evil to us. I like the NASB version of this, for it reads slightly different and with better focus saying, "...for you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing." (1 Peter 3:9b NASB}.

If you have ever wondered what your purpose was in life, Peter says this is one of your purposes! Like I said earlier, I don't like reading this, let alone living it. The idea that one of my purposes in life is to bless those that insult me, or plan or do evil to me, is just hard to accept. Regardless, this is all of our call, and there really is a blessing that is purposed in God, for those of us that learn to live this way. When God promises blessing, this is not something to be taken lightly, like when we say "bless you" after someone sneezes. This is the blessing of God. In the blessing of God is protection, provision, relationship, direction, interaction and presence. I guess if we turned this sentence around it might be easier to digest. It would read something Ike this -'if you want God's provision, protection, direction, and presence in your life, then bless those the insult you and persecute you, loving and caring for those that plan evil against you'.

So let us love and bless all, and open the for the blessing of God to poured into our lives