Highest Callings- Part 3
This is our third and final post about highest callings. There are what I consider to be three highest callings of the believer.
Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God… I John 3:1 (KJV)
God calls Himself our Father. As such, He loves us and cares for us, and wants to be in relationship with us. We are called to recognize God is the heavenly Father.
The next highest calling is to be called children of God. Imagine- God calls us His own children! We have sonship rights to be able to know, love, and fellowship with our heavenly Father.
The third one is that we are called to love others. As children of God, we are children of Love. Because God loves us, we love God and then other people.
The third highest calling is the call to love people with the love of God. God calls us to love the people we know and those we don’t know. God made us all, and every person is worth loving. God loved you and me, so He now calls us to be people of Love. We are born-again of a God of Love. He is love, and love is our identity too.
The greatest commandments are to love God, love yourself, and love others (Matthew 22:34-40). We are to love ourselves and others in the same way God loves us. The following verses show us the qualities and characteristics of love.
Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. I Corinthians 13:4-8 (NKJV)
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 (NKJV)
As we follow these verses and the greatest example of love, Jesus, we are fulfilling the third highest calling. Jesus laid His own life down to save us.
To summarize the three highest callings is to say one word: love. We are to walk in love. We have the Father of love, we are His beloved children, and we are people of love. As we walk in love, which is also called the fruit of the Spirit, we lay down our lives for others so they may know God as Father too. We give our all so others may fellowship with God and with other believers. Love is the fulfilling of all Scripture.
