Monthly Archives: February 2015

Love is Perfectly Demonstrated

The love of God toward us is shown in so many ways. Two passages that perfectly shout this love are those that follow.

 John 3:16
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

Romans 5:6-8
“For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

If you have not accepted this love and entered into a relationship with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, why not today? What good reason do you have to put it off one more day? More about His love tomorrow.

Love is from God

Since God is love (our previous post), then we can say love is from God. In 1John 4:7 we find, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.” In this verse, the word of means ‘out of the source of.’ Meaning, love is from God. He is the source of genuine love.

In many situations, love is degraded and twisted and cheapened. But the fact is we can love many people and many things in a wholesome way. When we do, we can honestly and biblically say love and the ability to express genuine love is because of God because love is from God.

Alzheimer’s Stats State by State 

State 2014 Projected 2025 % change
Mississippi 51,000 65,000 27.5%
Tennessee 110,000 140,000 110%
Indiana 100,000 130,000 30%
Ohio 210,000 250,000 19%
Georgia 130,000 190,000 46.2%
Florida 480,000 720,000 50%
Iowa 62,000 73,000 17.7%
Minnesota 88,000 120,000 36.4%
North Carolina 150,000 210,000 40%
Washington DC 9,200 9,000 -2.2%

Look at the chart and notice how your state compares to other states. Let me know if you would like information on the state in which you live or a state of interest. The chart lists the information for several states telling us …

  • 2014 reported cases of Alzheimer’s,
  • projected numbers for 2025 at the current trend, and
  • the percentage of change between 2014-2025

When we look at the numbers of people developing Alzheimer’s disease, if the numbers reported are accurate, there are some important questions. Why the inconsistencies? Why are some states or areas more or less affected? Is there something going on causing the numbers to be higher or lower in some regions of our country?

So many people have adopted the notion that Alzheimer’s is a natural part of the aging process. Their thought is, “If I get it, that’s too bad. There is really nothing I can do to prevent it.” But if Alzheimer’s and some of the other forms of dementia were a normal part of the aging process, should the percentage of change in the chart above be closer to consistent state-to-state? What is going on? Why is the percentage of change so different? Why are some areas of the country more or less affected. We will talk about that and much more in the forthcoming DADS Project workshops.

God is Love

Having looked at faith and hope from 1 Corinthians 13:13, we now turn to love.

What we need to see is, the very essence of God is love. It is important we begin here if for no other reason so many people see God and portray God has a mean God, a killing God, an angry God. But John, the disciple who ranks high if not highest on the list of those who knew the Lord and walked with the Lord during His earthly ministry, writes “God is love” (1John 4:8).

If we were to try and paint a picture of God, we could not use normal paint and canvas like we would with a typical painting because Jesus told us “God is Spirit and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” So, since we cannot use paint and canvas, we would paint our picture of God with words. Inside the frame of our picture would be at least 11 attributes. We would say that God is

  • Sovereign
  • Absolute Righteousness
  • Justice
  • Eternal Life
  • Omniscient (He knows everything)
  • Omnipotent (He is all powerful)
  • Omnipresent (He is everywhere simultaneously)
  • Immutable (He cannot lie)
  • Holy
  • Merciful, and
  • He is Love

Now, there is so much more to say and I will have more to say in the next several posts, but the emphasis I want to make here is God Is Love. He certainly does love people. We see that love in John 3:16. However, what we need to say and affirm first is – the very essence and DNA of God is love. That’s what John wants us to see in 1 John 4:8.

Why so many deaths? Is there a cure?

A few more important pieces of information and an important question:

  • In 2010, 83,494 people died from Alzheimer’s disease. That was the recorded cause of death on their death certificate.
  • It is believed that Alzheimer’s disease played some role in the death of at least 700,000 more people. Meaning, they died after having developed the disease.
  • Conventional wisdom says and the official current statement is, “Alzheimer’s disease leads to nerve cell death and tissue loss throughout the brain.” I believe the day will come when people will discover and be required to redo the former statement to say – Alzheimer’s disease is the result of nerve cell death and tissue loss in the brain due to a kind of “malnutrition” of important brain fuel.

This leads to the wider discussion about brain food and brain cell fuel. Is there food, some of which is on the shelf at our local markets and grocery stores, we ought to be consuming to feed our brain? We will discuss that and much more during upcoming workshops of The DADS Project.

Check the “Events” section of my website for upcoming workshops. If you are a pastor, church leader, or denominational worker, email me to receive a special recorded message about The DADS Project workshops. tom@tomsavage.us

Our Hope is Personal

For several days we have been examining the nature of hope as spoken of in 1 Corinthians 13:13 where Paul wrote, “Now abide faith, hope and love…” In Thessalonians 2:19, Paul personalized hope and said a major part of his hope, a major part of his forward confident expectation, was the people who had given their lives to the Lord. There he wrote, “For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?”

For sure, many of those people he thought of were still alive but quite possibly some he thought of had already experienced their departure into heaven. Paul had a deep longing to see his friends and loved ones and even people he had not personally led to Christ, standing before the Lord. That picture in his mind of all the saints ready for the Lord and standing before and knelling before the Lord propelled Paul to press onward as he looked upward. His hope and our hope should be very personal.

We are all at various stages in our walk with the Lord. Even if we have walked with the Lord for many years, there are times when we lose heart, when the path becomes a weary path. The key truth about hope is this –

Our confident, everlasting, forward-looking hope is based on the perfect plan of God. Even when it looks like evil is winning, keep on pressing on because our hope is in the resurrection of our Lord and His glorious return for us when our faith will be sight.

Tomorrow we begin looking at the third part of this marvelous trilogy. That would be the tremendous virtue of love. Take care