...the greatest gift of God is LOVE...

“28 From the fig tree learn its lesson: as soon as its branch becomes tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near. 29 So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that He is near, at the very gates. 30 Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.

32 But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Beware, keep alert, for you do not know when the time will come. 34 It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. 35 Therefore, keep awake, for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening or at midnight or at cockcrow or at dawn, 36 or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. 37 And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake” Mark 13:28-37.

When I was a kid growing up in a Roman Catholic church in Springfield, MA, Msgr. John Mitchell was our Pastor. Every Sunday when he preached, and I mean every Sunday, he always quoted these words of Jesus from Mark 13:31: “31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” He also always, and I mean always, told a very short joke that was very corny. But it was his love and predictability that we all came to admire and love. But as a young kid, his weekly repetition of Jesus’ words, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away…” left a deep impression on me.

Simply put, the word of God, the Scriptures, are our anchor in life. The Scriptures connect us to the very person and heart of Jesus. I agree that not every word in the Bible can be taken literally, but I believe without question that every word in the Bible is true. So I read the Scriptures and meditate on them every day. I think deeply about them in prayer, and my desire is always that these words of God will imbed themselves in my heart, in my mind, in my choices and in my words. Today, for example, I read

1 Corinthians 13 and fell in love again with verse 31: “And now faith, hope, and love remain, these three, and the greatest of these is love.”

At the end of the day, for me too, my life comes down to love. I love God, I love all people, and this love makes forgiveness very easy to understand and to give away immediately and repeatedly. I try every day to share my love for the people God brings into my life. I am far from perfect, for sure, but that is my prayer and my desire.

I hope you will read this remarkable chapter today, and I hope you take time to reflect on it in your life:

“1 If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; 6 it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9 For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part, 10 but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12 For now we see only a reflection, as in a mirror, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.

13 And now faith, hope, and love remain, these three, and the greatest of these is love.”