Learning Love (Friday Devotional)

 

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ.

- Philippians 1:9-10

There are certain places where I could spend hours and only scratch the surface of my interest.

Take the National Baseball Hall of Fame—my family and I once spent 3 straight days wandering through its exhibits, soaking up every moment. Within a week I was ready to go back.

Another example would be a great independent bookshop, like City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco or Hatchards in London. If I had all the time and all the money in the world, I would still never come close to quenching my thirst for more books.

One last place: the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. By now you know I’m a history nerd, but until you’ve seen me reading every placard in a history museum, you don’t know just how much of a nerd I really am. I could roam the Smithsonian all day long and never get tired of it.

We’ve all got certain interests where the desire to learn more, experience more, and take in more is seemingly never satisfied. Whether yours is your work, your hobbies, or something else entirely, there’s something where you’re never willing to settle for what you already know—you’re always on the hunt for even more.

In Philippians 1:9-10, the apostle Paul offers a thought-provoking prayer: that believers’ love for God and for one another would be something that would inspire that kind of insatiable spiritual hunger. His hope was that his fellow Christians would be so devoted to Christlike love that they would grow each day in “knowledge and depth of insight”—and yet, rather than being satisfied with the status quo, that they would wake up the next day ready for their love to abound even more.

In a world that is today so cynical, angry, and divided, his prayer resonates strongly. Each day you can devote yourself to abounding in love so that you can honor Christ, treat your neighbors well, and be obedient to God. By seeking to love better today than you did yesterday, by learning love daily, you not only bear witness to Christ, but you grow closer to Him. So may your life be a picture of Christlike love—and may you never get tired of learning how better to paint that picture.