And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds
As believers, we are given many instructions and encouragements on how to live godly lives. We are to draw near to the Lord with a true and undivided heart. It must be a broken and a contrite heart, that has an unshakable, confident assurance of our faith which is anchored to the steadfast promises of an unchanging God. We are to seize hold the many precious promises that relate to our salvation by grace through faith in Christ, and we do this by appropriating His cleansing flood in our own indifferent or bloodied hearts. We do this so that the burden of sin that lay so heavily upon our consciences, is laid, with an unshakable hope, upon the shoulders of our Heavenly Father, the Lord Jesus Christ Whose blood was shed in our place. But as believers, we are also instructed to be concerned about our brothers and sisters in Christ and to stir up one another unto love and good deeds. We are to care for each other and consider how to stimulate one another to love as Christ loved us, and to produce good deeds that God has prepared for us to do. We as believers are instructed: “To provoke others unto love and to good works.” As fallen creatures, it is all too easy to provoke each other to anger and strife through unkindness and criticism, but as believers we are instructed to provoke one another unto ‘love’. And it is through unchanging love that true love is provoked. It is by means of loving another that they become stimulated to love in return. It is through an unchanging attitude of never-failing Christ-like love towards our brothers and sisters in Christ, irrespective of their attitude towards us, that love can be motivated within them…as they see Christ living in us and loving through us. And just as love begets love, so too provoking others to good works by our own demonstration, will promote good works in them as well. Good works can only by carried out in our Christian life through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. And so we promote love and good works in others, in spirit and in truth. How blessed we are if we can reflect on our own lives and identify those that by God’s grace, patiently and lovingly provoked us to love and good works, by grace through faith in Christ.
Spiritual Steve 