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Mission Love

 
"Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained,                                                        But happy is he who keeps the law." (Proverbs 28:18) 

And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all of your mind, and with all of your strength.' The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these." (Mark 12:30-31)

 
      The word "vision" in the passage from Proverbs refers to prophetic revelation of the word of God. What it says is also true of less exalted visions. Mental pictures of a desired end provide the motivation for self-control (or keeping of a law) which ends in happiness. A mission then becomes the achievement of the vision. In Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Steven Covey wrote that one found one's mission by asking three questions: What do I want to be? What do I want to do? On what principles do I want to base my being and doing?
            After years of writing mission statements that did nothing for me, I discovered three things about them. The first is that they are not based on what we want to be or to do, but rather on what we are designed to be or to do. The second thing I discovered is that visions and missions come in two parts; one universal, the other individual. The universal mission is to love God with all our hearts, souls, minds and strength and to love our neighbor as ourselves. The individual part is the means by which you are designed to accomplish this. The third thing I've learned is that while we may be designed to  generally love in a particular way, in any given circumstance, we are called to love even if the means to do so doesn't match our individual mission. I love by researching and sharing information, but that doesn't mean that I can't love by doing the dishes.
            As we end 2015 and begin to look forward to 2016, take some time to prayerfully consider these questions:
1)   How can I love God this coming year?
2)   How can I love my "neighbors" (the people around me) better this coming year?
3)   What brings you so much joy that you can't imagine not being allowed to do it and does it benefit others in some way?
4)   What comes so naturally to you that not doing it would be locking you in a dungeon and throwing away the key? Does it benefit others in some way?
5)    What problems are you aware of in society? What problems in society eat at you? For what problems do you think, "someone should __________" and you have something with which to fill in that blank?







 


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