Peace, Love and Respect
Posted on: June 1, 2011
“So let us then definitely aim for and eagerly pursue what makes for harmony and for mutual up-building (edification and development) of one another” Roman 14: 19
Peace, Love and Respect; possibly three of the most common used words in the English dictionary.
What these three words have in common is that at one point or another in our lives, we will at some point be seeking to fulfill at least one, if not all of them;I mean everyone wants to be loved, everyone wants to be shown respect and if anyone is at all like me, they are in desperate need of peace… and quiet.
Peace in the dictionary is described as freedom from quarrelling, the ending of hostility or public security and order, but that’s not the kind of peace I’m talking about, I’m talking about Gods peace, a supernatural peace which isn’t of this world. It allows us to be free from fear and agitation and above all the feeling of being care free.
Gods peace come from us truly submitting ourselves to him and relying solely upon him, its about faith and having a good fear of God, respecting his will in our lives.
Respect is one of those words that can bring about instant destruction, everyone is seeking respect from someone whether it be an employer or our peers, we all demand to be respected, but what does it actually mean to give or receive respect?
When we consider respect what is it we’re actually asking for, to be esteemed amongst our peers and recognised? or maybe we just want an ego boost, an act of pride.
Deep down I think its just the pleasers in us that want to be acknowledged and therefore respected; however God calls us to be pleasers of him not each other, if we carried out each task we completed as a service to God – as we are required to do, and not to people maybe we wouldn’t need to demand respect at all.
The biggest misinterpretations of the word respect is fear, which is ever present within the school playground or the work office, people often use intimidation to get respect, but there is a very big difference between the two.
A lot of problems we all face from young to old is that we don’t really understand what respecting each other means, we think that it should be earned or traded, you respect me and i’ll respect you, but if we adhere and take heed to the word of God there would almost be no need to utter the word respect at all, because at the centre of respect we find LOVE and we are called to love everyone regardless.
..LOVE is such a powerful word and should be at the centre of every action we make, God calls on us to love our neighbours as we love ourselves, because if we merely love those who love us then what use is that, “as don’t the sinners love the people who love them also”.
We are called to love each other and to live and aim for harmony, when Paul speaks of the love chapter in Corinthians he calls on us to eagerly pursue this as the greatest of gifts which can be given to us, far above that of any other spiritual gift.
Love has the power to cover a multitude of sins and is at the centre of everything; Corinthians 13:4 says love endures long and is patient and kind, it’s not conceited or arrogant…what that chapter tells us is that love is the antedote, if we bring love into everything we do we can’t really go wrong; this is because God is love and he calls on us to make him centre of our lives.
Trouble is, our love comes withs terms and conditions, we love because of… but God loves us despite of…Gods love is far greater that anything that we could possible seek in this life because is it agape – unconditional.
On the 24th July we will be taking to London’s Hyde Park to host the first ever UK Gospel Music Festival; what’s different about this event?
That we have God at the centre of it, what this weeks theme words have in common is that God is the centre of each of them, to be able to seek peace we must first find God, in order to gain and most importantly respect others we must live as God called us to live and in order to love we must have God in us as God IS LOVE.
UGMF welcomes EVERYONE down to Hyde Park to enjoy a PEACEful environment where we come together RESPECTing our fellow neighbour and above all where we embrace LOVE .
Gods says where two or three are gathered for my name sake there I will be in the midst, well we are expecting 5000 people all joining together to hear beautiful music that has one purpose…
This is going to be an event you won’t want to miss register now http://www.ugmf.co.uk
UK Gospel Music Festival 
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