Radical Love: Learning to Love Those Who Hurt Us

Nathan: 00:00

So even when someone needs to be held accountable for their actions, we're not at the same time hating and belittling them. We can love them, we can care for them and hold them accountable. Those are not opposing concepts. So Jesus wants us to have the shape of radical love, even when we still hold people accountable for wrong actions.

: 00:22

You Hey,

Nathan: 00:28

I'm Nathan, and I want to welcome you back to the final episode of season six of the love shaped life podcast, where we talk about our dream to see experience and live in the center of God's radical love. This final episode is episode eight, and I'm here in the studio with my good friend Bob Hayes, which, by the way, our studio is actually the upstairs gathering space of your home here in Florida. So thank you. And behind the scenes you can't see him, but our producer, Elton, has been hanging out with us all day as we've laid down this season six of the love shaped life podcast. Well,

Bob: 01:11

it's exciting again to be here it is, and on this journey, especially looking at this first public declaration of Jesus, often known in Christian circles as the Sermon on the Mount, but we're looking at how he laid out the principles of his kingdom, and it's just been a great ride, and looking forward to the topic tonight, as we talk about, you know, loving your enemies and being kind to those who despitefully use you. And yes, so

Nathan: 01:47

Oh, well, I'll just say this because I forgot what I was going to say. The teaching of Jesus lays out these five he pulls these five ancient teachings, and he's using them to set the standard, set the gold bar for how Kingdom people behave. And here's what I forgot. We've been struggling with what to call this speech. And I looked back at notes from the last season, season five, and we called it Jesus inaugural address. I don't know why that didn't come back. I like the language. So this inaugural address, yeah, beautiful Jesus Season Five was about the first lines of this inaugural address. Then the first three episodes of this season was this transition period, which you can listen to those episodes to know what I'm talking about. And then these five, five guidelines, five laws. However, you want to talk about them from the ancient Hebrew, prophets, laws and Jesus then brings them, not really into the present, because the people that he's speaking to were familiar with the laws as well. But what he does is he raises the bar, takes them from outside actions, for the most part, to inside actions that change how we treat people. Yeah,

Bob: 03:05

and I like to describe it the way we were describing it in previous episodes that Jesus took the baby out of the dirty bathwater, right? So he took the teachings from the Law and the Prophets, which they understood but had been gotten dirty because of the religious garbage of the teachings that had just been regurgitated over and over and gotten worse and worse and worse. So Jesus throws out all of that dirty water. Just takes it, throws it out, and pulls out the baby, right, and says, This is what it really was its intention. Yes, this was really the intention, and this is what I came for. Was the SEC set the record straight, and that's we've been looking at. That's the exciting part. And like we were talking about in between podcasts, we were talking about how Jesus was non apologetic at what he was communicating. I mean, he he was speaking truth and love, right? Because he was kind in what he was doing, but he was straight up,

Nathan: 04:06

he had to be, because what was held as truth was not working, and it was headed down a path it

Bob: 04:14

was destructive, instructed the people. The people were just wore out and burdened down and and Jesus was taking those burdens off their shoulders and giving them hope and yes and relief from all the guilt and shame and stuff that the religious people just kept pile on their shoulders. Religious leaders kept piling it on, you know, over 600 laws and just coming up with more.

Nathan: 04:41

So we're at the last of these five examples Jesus gives, and one of us is going to read the text. You want to do it? Or me? No, I'll

Bob: 04:50

read it. All right? More than happy to read it. Okay? This is taken from Matthew the first book of the New Testament, in verse 43 and. You have heard that it was said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you that you may be sons of your Father in heaven, for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you do? Not even tax collectors do the same. And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do? More than others do not even the tax collectors do so. Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect,

Nathan: 05:46

so this is these are the final words of Jesus, not in the inaugural address, not in this mountainside lecture, but in this section, Jesus will transition to a new focus in His teaching. In the next section of of this address. So we're wrapping up. He's wrapping up these five examples. This is the final one. I think it's fascinating to to return to the first one, which was, you've heard that it was said, Thou shalt not kill. I think that's right, isn't it going back to let me just jump back and make sure murder, thou shall not murder, right? Thou shalt not murder. And

Bob: 06:24

that's correct, it was the first one.

Nathan: 06:27

Yeah, I'm just looking here because, yes, that's right. So Jesus talked about hatred there, and he focused especially on reconciliation. Kind of the first emphasis was reconciliation between fellow followers of Jesus. Like within the community of believers, you need to have a life that seeks to be in harmony with the people around you, right? That's his first piece. By the time he gets to the end of these five examples, Jesus is talking about this radical idea of loving enemies. And again, all of these five are related to relationship.

Bob: 07:11

But you know, he starts off saying, you've heard that it was said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. There's nothing that I know of in the law and the prophets that was teaching to love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Am I correct?

Nathan: 07:29

Yeah, I think that's true. I think the people had construed The idea, though, because the love your enemy was there, right, right? But you look at the ancient Hebrew people. When God was establishing them, there were very clear boundaries between the nation, the Hebrew nation, and the surrounding nations. You can't intermarry with them. I think what happened is, as the people interacted, they assumed that that clear line between the non Jewish nation, nations and the Jewish people, or the Hebrew people, I think they had assumed, falsely assumed, that that line in the sand was there because God wanted them to look down on or to hate the non Jew and to love each other. I think that had be It was a misunderstanding. But I think that's where this comes from. They had construed this, that this division between the Jew and the non Jew implied that God's vision for them was antagonism toward the non Jew and love for each other. Yeah, and

Bob: 08:34

I understand the word construe, right? That they construed it, but I don't think it was a misunderstanding, right? I'm there was no misunderstanding. Is that the word you used a misunderstanding? Sorry, but there was no misunderstanding on their part. Because the the religious leaders in Jesus's day and correct me if I'm wrong, but they were indulging hatred, oh, sure, sure, for not only the Romans, but also for what we know as the Samaritans, right, right? I mean, they hated them. They considered that if they even touched a Samaritan, that they had defiled themselves, right, right, correct, yeah.

Nathan: 09:13

But the misunderstanding part is that, going back in the day, they were very clear laws about the distinction between foreigners and shoes and so I think they had construed that, yeah, that they had taken that, that distinction, and assumed that because God made the distinction, that God therefore justified hatred of the surrounding nation. So now, when they hate the Samaritans, well, we hate the Samaritans because they've got a perverted religion. They've compromised their faith by intermarrying with the nations. I think that's how they couch us as religiously justifiable, because in their minds, they could hate somebody who wasn't in line with God the way they thought they needed to be. Yeah,

Bob: 09:54

and again, as their relationship with God strayed the. Their their their perception, yes, of the ways of God's truth, right? This is the darkness that comes on their minds. Darkness comes on our mind, right, right? Because, really, ultimately, Israel was called to be the light of the world, right, right? They were to be the light of the world. They were to bring a knowledge of God to the world, just like the Christian church today is to bring, to be the salt and the light, right, right, as we've talked about the salt and the light. But so what happened was, again, to justify themselves. They're they're like, Oh yeah, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But they even used to debate who their neighbor was. Well, they did, yes, right? So, so, and that's why Jesus had to tell the parable of the Good Samaritan, right? Because the the Samaritans were the ones they hated, and he was the one that ended up helping the Jew, that he was the good guy and got the Jew, that was the one that got beat up and left by the wayside, yes, and then the the Levite and the Pharisee just walked right by him,

Nathan: 10:57

right? When Jesus help him? Jesus highlighted some some examples from the the ancient Hebrew times in their ancient history, where non Jews had experienced God's goodness, and he he almost got himself killed by pointing that out, because of this deep, like seething hatred for anybody who's who could love show compassion for a non Jew, or anyone who was a non Jew. It was baked into the identity of the average citizen in the average Hebrew living at that time,

Bob: 11:36

right? So here he comes along, Jesus again, talking about radical comes along and says, you know you heard that has been said of old time, Thou shalt love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be the sons of your Father in heaven, for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the just upon the unjust. Wow, that was some pretty heavy duty stuff, because not only did they hate the Samaritans, but they hated the Romans, and now Jesus is saying, I want to be the salt and light, right? And are they persecuting you? Yeah, they're oppressing you. Well, do good to them. Do good.

Nathan: 12:26

Pray for them. Pray that God will bless their family. God as that soldier goes out in the battlefield, please keep that Roman soldier safe. This is a radically shifting like this is just upsetting their whole world, at least if they've embraced this striated this society of us versus them, and we're better and you're worse, if they've embraced that, this is totally turning the apple cart upside down, and

Bob: 12:56

he's specifically saying, listen, that you may be the sons of your Father in heaven. This is what sonship is. This is what being a child of your Father in heaven is. Is one that loves like this. Because ultimately, as you read the story again, looking to the story of the Bible, we see that Jesus ended up loving his enemies, right? Yes, which really in the book of Romans, Paul said that he died when we were his enemy, for us while we were his enemy. So he he gave his life for us who were his enemy in order to save us from the effects of sin on our life. So the intent appears to be, as we love our enemies, as we do good is to help bring salvation, as we would call right, the the power of a savior into other people's lives. Because the kingdom of God was not a narrow kingdom, it was a kingdom for everybody, right? And that was that must have been just mind blowing,

Nathan: 13:57

yes? So here's an interesting thing. This is the first time in this section, this first section, where Jesus very specifically identifies God with a behavior. It's not mentioned in any of the preceding four examples. But when Jesus says, Love your enemies, he specifically calls out the fact that that's exactly who God is. Wow, that's beautiful. That's beautiful that the heart of God is a heart that beats with goodness toward people who hate him. Yeah, that's, that's just who he

Bob: 14:35

is. I love that because he's, he's pulling back the veil, right of who the true God is, right? So here you have this picture of God that's been given to them by these Pharisees, you know, in the leaders of the of the religion. In fact, Jesus, again, said that they were of their father, the devil, right? If you can imagine that religious leaders. Is talking about God and Jesus identifying that their father or their god is of the devil. And so here we have this new picture right now. Not only is God as your Father, but this God, Who is your father,

Nathan: 15:13

loves his enemies. He loves his enemies. And the other thing is

Bob: 15:17

so sorry, sorry. But so he's saying that he loves the Romans. Oh, he loves the Samaritans, and he loves you, right? So he loves every human being in this world. So

Nathan: 15:32

you got to let your heart change. Oh, well, you can't be in this kingdom. There's no place for you in this kingdom. Your heart has animosity

Bob: 15:40

towards somebody else. And, you know, he gives the illustration there, yeah. So

Nathan: 15:44

can we pause just a minute? Yeah, sure. Of course, the people highly respected the religious leaders of the day. Yeah, they they were it, and they had cultivated a very effective appearance of high holiness. They dressed well. It was clear God was blessing them. At least, that's what it looked like.

Bob: 16:09

They were quote, unquote, religious people, right? And the

Nathan: 16:13

assumption of the theology of the day was if, if your life is successful, God is blessing you. So the people saw these religious leaders clearly doing well, and assumed that God was blessing them. They they were very particular about about following religious guidelines, how far you could walk on the Sabbath, about Jesus specifically mentions this one in another place, tithing the herbs in their garden. They were very particular. They were very particular about God's God's judgment on evil. So the people are seeing the picture of of God being painted by them. And there was a sense in which it was this picture of a very holy, High, Exalted God the way that the external picture was, but what Jesus was saying is actually that painting is completely wrong, and that's why he has to name you. You've heard them talk about God, but I'm going to name for you, describe for you very specifically what God is like, so what his heart is like. He loves enemies. So all that you've seen painted by these religious leaders is a mirage. The truth about God is that God actually loves people who hate him. So he's naming this because he's got to turn this whole thing on its head that has stood in the way of seeing the true God.

Bob: 17:47

That's beautiful, absolutely beautiful. So if they had painted the picture of God on a whiteboard, Jesus just took an eraser and wiped it all out, right? Which was huge again, and but now he's painting a new picture, yes, right? A picture of a god. Who's your father, right? He's your father. Yeah, you people down there, you you poor, oppressed people and all that you're going through, the ones that were burdened down. God's your father

Nathan: 18:15

easier. And Daddy would be, also be appropriate. Language is very affectionate, very

Bob: 18:20

affectionate and forefather. And this God, He loves the Romans, he loves the Samaritans, in spite of what you've been taught, that it's to love your neighbor and hate your enemy. This is incorrect, because you're the true God loves his enemies. And he loves those Romans, he loves those Samaritans, and he's asking you to love them too. He's asking you to pray for them. He's asking you to do good to them, and that's what's going to make you a child of God, right?

Nathan: 18:56

So go ahead. Well, I'm just thinking of the implications of that. This is a powerful moment where Jesus is really, truly introducing. It's not introducing, he's reinforcing what he's been introducing about a totally different way of being human. And I think of that in relationship to, you know, whose side am I on when it comes to the conflict in the Middle East right now, who's right? College campuses right now are there's protests supporting one side or the other. Right? When it comes to politics in America, who's right? Who should I vote for? Who right? That's the big question, right, who's right, who's and so we have this wrangling. And what Jesus is saying, pray for all of them, because, in fact, God is madly in love with every single one of them. All of them are lost people, all of I shouldn't say all of them lost. People. That's not the way I want to say it. All of them are human beings, beloved by God, struggling with life, messed up, mixed up, confused in some way, God wants all of them to have the best life possible, which is to experience the transformative power of love. We've got to stop seeing, and Jesus is moving us to stop seeing all these divisions and differences. We're all fallen human beings in need of a savior and beloved by God, no matter what flag we fly, no matter what our ballot looks like in the voting booth, we're all human beings desperately loved by God, well, in need of a Savior, in need of transformation, because in some way we're all broken and messed up and need the reshaping power of His love. Ever wonder

Bob: 20:51

what it's like to truly experience God's love? At love shape life. We're here to guide you on that journey through our weekly emails, podcasts, blogs, coaching and more. We're helping people just like you discover the transformative power of Divine Love. Join

Nathan: 21:08

our community at love shaped dot life and be part of a movement that's changing lives. Love shaped life. Your partner in the journey of seeing, experiencing and living God's love,

Bob: 21:23

yeah, because the big picture is, again, the storyline of the Bible is that sin is affected all of our life, right? And so the big picture is that God wants to save us from the effect of sin in our life, and that's through a knowledge of Him and seeing his beauty and seeing the storyline right, that there's a savior, right, who gave his life for every human being, right? And that this is, this is again, you know, stretching the mind that that God ultimately loves every human being, right? He loves people that are Christians, Atheists, Muslims, you know, whatever religion people come from, or non religion, he loves them all right, and and he desires the good for all of them, yes. So he's saying, Listen, you want to be salt and light in this world, then love your enemies. Do good to those who spitefully use you, right, persecute you, bless them. Don't curse them, right,

Nathan: 22:21

right? Sin is killing all of us, and the devil's doing a

Bob: 22:25

good job. They're getting us Yes,

Nathan: 22:27

yes. And so just this massive shift, it's pretty radical, just as I'm thinking about it, and the different ways that society is split up, even in my own mind, and just saying, God, I want to be able to see and to love like you love. To stop seeing the differences, name your difference, to stop seeing that difference and start seeing a human being, a person beloved by God, not the labels, not the flags, not the whatever, but just a person beloved by God. That God is shaping my heart into also loving radically,

Bob: 23:10

no. And what the real need is in our world, right? Is a Savior, and that Savior is Jesus Christ, yeah, it's not another peace treaty. It's not, it's it's this. This is human beings will find another war to fight, right? There'll be more straight. Besides the war, there's wars in our own homes,

Nathan: 23:29

absolutely, yeah, bring it, right? Oh yeah. This

Bob: 23:33

is strife. So as salt and light God is saying, Let me love through you, right? But you still have to make a choice. You know, you still have to make a choice. You know. He gives us example you're talking about that you may be sons of your Father in heaven, for he makes his son to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rained upon the just upon the unjust. He's saying, look and just look at nature, right? The sun comes up every day, and that sun is giving its warmth and all discriminately, indiscriminately, to the good and to the evil. Right. The rain is coming along and falling to the ground and providing for the good and for the evil. This is who your father is, and this is who I want you to be. This is what is called to be a citizen of the kingdom, yeah? Just like God reigns upon the just and upon the unjust, I want you to do the same.

Nathan: 24:33

Just give away love like candy, yeah, yeah. Let

Bob: 24:36

let love transform, because love will conquer hatred. Yeah, this is the light that will conquer the darkness. Trust God that this then follow what he says and not what men are saying, not what the religious leaders might be saying, trust what God is saying, because what God is saying will win in the end. Love. Will win in the end of this battle.

Nathan: 25:01

So it probably doesn't need saying, but I'll say it just in case. This isn't Jesus saying wrong does not need address. This isn't Jesus saying people who do bad things don't need held accountable. This is Jesus saying Your heart needs to be shaped in in the shape of my love. Yes, people, legal action can be taken appropriately. Yes, the courts have a place. Yes, a person who steals from you should be held accountable like this is not dismantling the legal system or dismantling justice, but it's it's reshaping the heart where we're not driven by self interest. We're not driven by revenge. We're not driven by by racial divide or whatever other divide. We're not we don't see the world through those glasses. Yes, we work for justice where that's appropriate, but we don't see the world the way the broken human heart sees it. God's reshaping it. So even when someone needs to be held accountable for their actions, we're not at the same time hating and belittling them. We can love them, we can care for them and hold them accountable. Those are not opposing concepts. So Jesus wants us to have the shape of radical love, even when we still hold people accountable for wrong actions?

Bob: 26:22

Yeah. I think we need to remember, in in context of what you're saying there, that holding people wrong for wrong actions, we're talking about civil issues, right, right? So we're talking about civil matters, where somebody does it wrong, well, they need, there would need to be held accountable for right? Yeah. Now what Jesus is calling us to do is is, yeah, we're dealing with that, but there's a higher matter here. These are spiritual matters that that their their hearts still need changing. Yes, right? Absolutely, so, because the big picture here is we're all just passing through this world, and God desires all of us to be in heaven, right, right? All of us to come to repentance and and to accept Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord of our life, that we might find and experience oneness with him and leaning into him, being transformed by him, so we can live with him, that that's the goal, right? And we need to realize that he doesn't want us to live just in the civil he wants to realize that that we're called to something higher. Yes, we've got to deal with the civil matters, but we're called to something higher. Yeah, and that's to lead people to untrue knowledge of God, right, right? So I'm going to pray for these people, right? I'm going to pray for them. If I have an opportunity, I'm going to speak life into them, regardless of what they've done, right? Right? We need to speak life into Yeah, this is, this is the bigger picture, right? This is what he wants us to keep in mind. It's not just about the here and the now, right? It's about eternal matters. What matters most, and that's the way God sees it. Would have us to see it as well, right? And this shift inside

Nathan: 28:01

of us, where we have that reshaped or that new heart, as scripture talks about a new way of thinking and feeling about each other, about ourselves, about God,

Bob: 28:14

yeah, and I want to throw in here. You know Nathan, where he said to pray for your enemies. Praying for our enemies is not just that God would help them when we're when we're choosing to do that, it's changing our heart.

Nathan: 28:31

Yeah, that's right. So

Bob: 28:32

I think the greater impact of praying for enemies is not the impact our enemies, but it's the impact on us, because when we choose to follow what what God has called us to do. And we come before Him and we're praying, there's a there's the grace of God is working on our hearts and shaping our hearts. That's him, right? So people would say to me, Well, how can we love our enemies? How can anybody love their enemies? Well, it's impossible for you to love your enemies. Pause, where anybody sort of love their enemies? But when the SPIRIT OF LIVING GOD is living in you, when God is present in you, that's the only spirit kid that can enable you to put love for an enemy, right? The only one. This is, this is what's identifying us as children of God. It's, it's nothing you're mustering up. It's what God is promising to do in you. So

Nathan: 29:24

that's why, back at the beginning of this address, where Jesus lays out these principles that we talked about in season five, that when we, as we come clean about the truth about ourselves and our own need of God's love, and then accept his love. The impact of that is that we become freed, increasingly freed, to love like he loves, amen. So that's why those principles, those initial principles he lays out in his address, are so important. Hmm, because those are about shaping our hearts so that we do begin to think differently about people that are our enemies.

Bob: 30:13

And again, this is who God is to the very core, if we want, if we choose, to be part of His kingdom, we've got to allow him, the king, right to shape our hearts to become like his. That's right. That's the identifying mark. 100% notice, the scripture goes on to says that if you love those who love you, what reward have you do? Not even tax collectors do the same. And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do? More than others do not even tax collectors do so. Therefore, thou shalt be perfect. You shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect. You know, notice the contrast here? You know, he's saying, If you love those who love you, what credit is that, right, right? You're just same thing, like the tax collector everybody else. Remember, they hated the tax collectors, right? Right? The so the people all related, right? You know, they're just, you know, nobody likes tax season and pay unless you're getting money back. So there's a real grumbling, and back then they would knock on your door and come to collect that money from you. So you can imagine seeing a tax collector when the doorbell rings, you not happy to see him, right? Right, right? No. And a lot of them were crooks. So they would, they would get money that they o government that then they would get extra money they'd put in their pocket, right? And pretty much people knew that, so there was a hatred for him. So Jesus is saying, Look, tax collectors, the one you don't like, they, they at least love each other, right, right? So if you're doing the same, What? What? What's the difference?

Nathan: 31:52

And here's the fascinating thing about this statement, the the Jew, the Jewish people, right? They think that they're, they're thinking that they're better than everybody else, because we have, you know, we have this great prophetic record. This is our land. It was pro it was the it was promised to Abraham, and we're in this land like they're feeling really good about themselves, like we're, we are, like these elite people, right? And and and those people, those Samaritans, they have a corrupt bloodline because they intermarried with the Assyrians, etc. That's back in their history. So, but we're good because we're still pure, right? And what Jesus says is, all those people you don't like, if all you do is love the people just like you, you're no different.

Bob: 32:40

Well, that's good, yeah, you're no different. So they're puffing

Nathan: 32:43

themselves up, like, Hey, look at our stuff. And he's like, No, if your behavior is identical to their behavior, actually you're no different.

Bob: 32:53

So what makes you different is how you love,

Nathan: 32:57

how you love the people who don't fit into your category, yeah,

Bob: 33:01

yeah. That's why he said, therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect in the book of Luke telling this, yeah, go for telling the Gospel story here. And he says it like this. He says that, but if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners, love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive back, what credit is that to you? For even sinners, lend to sinners to receive as much back, but love your enemies do good, lend, hoping for nothing return, and your reward will be great, and you will be the sons of the Most High, for he is kind the unthankful and the evil. Therefore Be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful.

Nathan: 33:52

So this idea, I love, those lines, this, this, either Luke is hearing Jesus teach this at a different location, and Jesus mixes things up, or Luke gets different details, same concepts are being taught. The wording is fascinating, that it's a little different. Be merciful, like your heavenly Father is merciful the perfection of God that's referenced in in Matthew's account of this mountainside teaching, is the radical, his radical way of loving. And that's what God's holding up Jesus holding up to them. He's saying, be perfect like, aspire to the beauty of God. Loving like he loves,

Bob: 34:42

loving, like he loves. And I like when he says, Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect. Here he is. It's like he's going through this whole, you know, his inauguration speech, right? He's, he's continuing on the journey of the auguration inauguration speech. And any, any comes down, and it's like. He's saying, Okay, here's the sum of it all. Be perfect, like your Father in heaven is perfect. Be merciful, like your Father in heaven is perfect. When God says, Be he's he's offering the power to be of transformation. He's offering it to you. He's not saying like we said, before you go and do this, go struggle and love your enemies and figure it out. No, he's saying, lean into me and also change your heart. I'm gonna give you a heart like mine. And this is why Jesus came, that we might have these new hearts and these new lives, to be able to love from his perspective. And so he's saying, lean into me and I'll make it happen in your life.

Nathan: 35:42

So it's almost a declaration of, this is who you are, as you lean into me, be this like God said, Let there be light. And there was light back in the Genesis story. So here it's similar. Is that what you're saying, it's similar that God is making this declaration that I can just lean on that he can do this thing in my life where I begin increasingly to love like he loves. It's

Bob: 36:07

what he's promising, right? Yeah, it's what God is promising. And it's a beautiful thing, because we can't produce it of ourselves, but God has promised to recreate it in us, right? That a new heart. I'll give you a new spirit. I'll put within you. I'll take the stony heart out of your flesh, and I'll give you a heart of flesh, right? Yes, this new heart, God is giving us a heart transplant. I'm going to take this, the effect that sin has had on your heart, to give you this, this self centered living. I'm going to take you out, and I'm going to give you this new heart, a heart that can love from my perspective. Yeah,

Nathan: 36:43

that's beautiful. So so I want to re emphasize to our listeners, if you have not listened to season five, which is all about leaning in to a God who changes human hearts, and the process of doing that, if you haven't listened to season five, listen to season five. If you've already listened to season five, go back and listen to season five. It's that important. Jesus, in the first lines of this inaugural address, lays out these powerful principles for experiencing the power of God's love in our lives. And you don't want to miss them, so go back to season five, and if you like what you're hearing, share it with a friend, like and subscribe that helps to expand the visibility of what we're sharing and doing here at Love shaped life. And keep an eye on our bookstore, because we are at some point going to make available a second book that Bob and I are writing based on see the season five podcast, and going to convert that podcast into a book. We're going to be expanding, building, refining that will become a book, because we think those principles are life changing principles.

Bob: 37:58

And we're also creating a card deck, we

Nathan: 38:01

are, we are, and we don't have much details yet, but that's coming. So

Bob: 38:05

there's there's resources in the works for you to help you in your journey. That's what love shaped life is all about. We're here to help you in your journey. If you would like to contact us, you can do so at info, dot, love shape life.

Nathan: 38:19

I don't know it's info at love shape. Dot life info

Bob: 38:23

at love shape, right? You got it right, right? Yeah, yeah. So just connect with us there. We're here to help you anything that you're in need of. We pray for you. We pray for those that are connecting with us. We want the best, because God wants to shape your life and make your heart like his. That's right. So until next time,

Nathan: 38:44

lean into the love shaped life. Thank you so much for tuning into the love shaped life podcast. We hope you find this podcast not only inspirational, but life changing. Here at love shaped life, we're working to create a community, an online community, in fact, where individuals like you can connect with each other and lean into God's love together. We also

Bob: 39:11

provide spiritual wellness coaching, where we walk alongside people to help them to see the beauty of God's character, discover if there's anything that might be hindering them from finding the healing power that's in that love.

Nathan: 39:24

And as you might have expected, love shaped life is crowdfunded. Individuals like you give generously to make this dream a reality. If you'd like to join that crowd, you can give today at loveshaped dot life you