Love as a lifestyle.
Whatever influences  your thoughts, attitude, perception and behaviour determines the way you live your life. Your Lifestyle defines who you are to the people around you. The way you live  your life is a choice; a product of what you spend most of your time thinking and doing.

Ephesians 5:2
[2]Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.

The ministry of Jesus was a love-ministry. All that inspired and motivated Him was love. He was moved with compassion in His heart and as a result, He did many miracles. Jesus did what He saw His father doing; deeds of love(John 5.19). He healed the sick, cast out demons, raised the dead, taught people, and more that were not recorded, all were demonstration of God's love.
When God called us to be His sons together with Christ(Romans 8.29), He poured out His love on our heart through the Holy spirit( Romans 5.5). So that we may  love from a genuine heart (1 Peter 1.22). We didn't know how to love. Love was a strange thing to us. We thought doing good deeds to people was enough to show that we love them(Isaiah 64.6), but the scriptures reveals to us that apart from love even our good deeds are nothing(1 Corinthians 13.2). God demanded more than just good deeds, He desires us to be immersed into His love.

Ill never forget the day i experienced the baptism of love. It was tangible, the liquid love of God filled my spirit. I felt it flowing so smoothly in my soul, burning like a fire yet so cool and sweet. It transformed me from inside out.

Hebrews 10:24
[24]Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.

We thank God, through Jesus Christ, He gave us the nature that produces love and right living. The nature that could soak the love of God and freely demonstrate it to people around us. Jesus said and i quote "You will be known to be my true disciples through your love." (John 13.22). Christian are called to be the reflection of God's love. I can attest to you, that the world is longing for love. They crave for Love! They don't know what true love is. For those who don't have the spirit of Jesus don't belong to Him (Romans 8.9). The whole of creation long to see the manifestation of the sons of God (Romans 8.19). We are called to be the source of love to the World.

Do people see the love of Christ through you? Without even saying your born again or preaching to them, does your deeds display love?

It hard to love people who have never experienced love. They are stubborn. They prove to you that they cant be loved. They become more rude and arrogant. Our patience is tested, but we remember love never fails( 1Corinthians 13.7). Instead, it burn coals on their heads( Romans 12.20) and within time they are trapped by it. They become victims of love

Sometime you wonder why we should love people who don't love us back. People who have nothing pleasing. Nothing attracts us to love them, but Jesus  said that the heathens love those who love them and everybody does that (Luke 6.32). Our mentality should be different, we love those who are unloved, just like our Father who loved us when we did nothing pleasing before Him. The believers also have their weaknesses and faults. Therefore, the scripture tells us to  be patient with each other's faults.(Ephesians 4.2).

The more we spend time with God, as we behold His beauty, focusing our eyes on Jesus the perfecter of our faith, the more we are transformed from within to love people. We are energized, ignited and flamed by His Love. We  have confidence to say that love compels us to do. It becomes irresistible force within us, the children of God. We can't give something we don't have. We acquire from Him freely and we give it away freely. The Presence of God is rich in love. Its an atmosphere of love, where we are undone. Like a sponge soaks water and it become full till it drips, so is our spirit when we soak in the Presence of God, you drip love. Owe no man anything except love.

When i received Jesus as my lord, the first change i noticed was how i loved God and people.. There was an unmistakable love that was so evident in my life, i know u can identify with that if you are truly born again.I became so generous, i was never one before. During my high school life bread was somethings so precious. Its was everything  to us, the only sweet thing that was available at the moment.  One day i  decided to  give away my bread to everyone in our class. We were thirty eight of us and for a whole month i sacrificed my bread. This act not only changed the people around me, but also my heart. Love found its way in me.

God judges the motives of our heart. Sign and wonders are part of us, but we don't perform them to show how anointed we are. They are tools that God uses to spread His love. They display the goodness and mercies of God. Jesus refused to perform the miracles when he was asked by the pharisees because He knew their motive was not love. Demonstrate His love through the Power of the Holyspirit. The gifts of the Spirit flows only through Love.

Colossians 3:14
[14]Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.

Your thoughts, deeds and words should  be inspired by love alone. What do you think about people? How do you talk about them? May you words be seasoned with grace to your hearers that they may find no fault in you. Saturate your thoughts with love, and Christ will find a room in your heart. Whatever a man think of so is he. Your action manifest what is in your heart. When your heart is flooded with love, your deeds will display love.

LIVE A LIFESTYLE OF LOVE!

I recommend these books:

• Love as a way of life- Gary Chapman
• Reduce me to love- Joyce Meyer
• Transformed by love- Leif 

Power points

• We are called to walk in love
• Spend  time with God to grow in Love
• You cant give what you don't have
• Love has both spiritual and eternal rewards
• Whatever you do should be inspired by love.

Prayer 

Lord Jesus your amazing, you taught us to Love that we may live in it and walk by it. Help us Jesus to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit so that we may live a lifestyle of love. 

WEEK 2.
LOVE AS A COMMAND.
Hurry! Its another week of going deeper into Love.
The previous week we learn about the extravagant Love of God. We understood that God loves us unconditionally and we can't do anything to earn His Love. He freely loved us through Jesus Christ.

This week we will learn about Love as a command. The greatest commandment we are given is Love. Its easy to understand love as a commandment, when you get to know how much God loves you.

Matthew 22:37-40
[37]Jesus replied, “‘You must love the lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’
[38]This is the first and greatest commandment.
[39]A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’

The greatest commandment is to Love God and people. Since God has poured out His Love on our hearts (Rom 5.5-6). He expect us to live and walk in love.
The 10 commandments among many others, which the Israelites were given by God through Moses, displayed God's standard and righteousness. The commandment were holy and good (Romans 7.12), but the Israelites failed to attain the demands of the law. They couldn't reach the requirements of God, for there were already captive of sin. They murmured and tested God in the wilderness, for they couldn't discern God's Love for them. They lacked the baptism of Love. When God soaks you in His love ull have the nature and power to live a love-life.
We thank God that Jesus brought a new covenant, the covenant of Love. He fulfilled all the requirements of God, he made them all to be love. Something we can live everyday enjoying to do, for Love is freedom. We are not bound to anything.

Galatians 5:14
[14]For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.

Romans 13:9
[9]For the commandments say, “You must not commit adultery. You must not murder. You must not steal. You must not covet.” These—and other such commandments—are summed up in this one commandment: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

The law and the requirements of God to us were summed up in one law, "Love."
You will realize that if you walk in love and in God who is love. There are things you will not desire to do to your neighbour. Greed, selfishness, pride, bitterness and jealousy all operates outside the realm of love. They lead to strife and wicked desires to satisfy self. "Consider other greater than you," (Philippians 2.3.) Is a statement of love. You cant consider other people greater than youself, if the love of God have not purged you.

Its all that is required of you.

LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD
Deuteronomy 6:5
[5]And you must love the lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.

Deuteronomy 30:6
[6]“The lord your God will change your heart and the hearts of all your descendants, so that you will love him with all your heart and soul and so you may live!

Wow! This is incredible. As much as God commands us to love Him. He will change our hearts first so that we may know how to love Him. We worship God from our hearts not our deeds alone. The only way we can effectively love God from a genuine and a sincere heart is allowing Him to change our heart through His love. He wants our whole being for Himself.
We are all products of Love.
Love God with your emotions, your strength and with your all.

Last year, a time like this i was undergoing an emotional breakdown. I was very keen on how to express my emotions to anyone. I feared to trust people again with my emotions. I was disappointed, hurt and frustrated, by the people i loved, this changed a lot in me. It affected my relationship with God. I also feared to express my emotions to Him. Its until God told me that He wants my emotions for Himself,it then i became free. Free to cry, laugh, dance and rejoice in His presence. He delivered me. Am not afraid to be loved or to love, for i have surrendered my emotions to Him.
God want us to love Him, by giving Him our all.

1 John 4:20
[20]If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see?

To love God is to Love people. You can't say you love God if you don't love people He first loved. Have genuine Love, show deep affection and compassion to people. Love both sinners and your brothers in the faith. For this pleases God.

To love God is to obey His commands, that is to live according to His Holy word(1 John 2:5[5]But those who obey God’s word truly show how completely they love him.) That is how we know we are living in him. Be doers of the Word not hears only. (James 1.22) For it is in doing the Word that you produce lasting fruits of love.

LOVE OTHER PEOPLE

1 John 3:11
[11]This is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another.
1 John 2:7
[7]Dear friends, I am not writing a new commandment for you; rather it is an old one you have had from the very beginning. This old commandment—to love one another—is the same message you heard before.

Its repeated several times that we should love one another. There is no doubt about it. In the witness of two or three a matter is established.. I love the book of 1 John. It talk so plainly about love. I strongly believe that John, one of the disciples of Jesus, understood the Love of God so deeply. He had the audacity of saying, "the disciple whom Jesus loved"(John 13.23) referring to himself in his writings. He was always with Jesus together with James and peter in most occasion. He experience the heart of Jesus which is love and personalize it for His own freedom. God opened His inner eye and revealed deep things of the future and he wrote the book of revelation. This is just amazing what Love can do.

My best song this year is "touch of heaven" one of it verses says that, all i want is to live within your love, be undone by who you are my desire is to know your deeper.
This my pray everyday, that God will undo me in His love. That ill live to declare it and produce what is love alone.

...faith, hope and love remains and the greatest is love.(1 Corinthians 13.13)

You can do many things to please God, but if you do them outside the realm of love its vain. Our motive should be only love.
 You can move mountains and speak tongues of men and angels but without love all is nothing.(1corinthians 13.1-2) .Righteousness and holiness flows only through love. You can't pursue the things of God outside love. The foundation of all things in the kingdom of God is love.
So i urge us to accept the command of God, which is to love Him from a pure heart and love people with genuine affection.

Power points

• The greatest commandment is love
• Love the Lord your God and one another
• To love God is walk according to His Word and loving His people
• To love people is to show genuine affection toward them.
• Anything done outside the realm of love is sin and not of God.

Prayer
Thank you God, for your loving kindness. You have changed our hearts, so that we may love you and love one another. Thank you for you have not burden us with many law but only to love. Undo us in your love, that we may display it to humanity. Amen.

Week 1

THE LOVE OF GOD
Do you believe God loves you unconditionally? Most people believe that God loves them only when they do good, but when they do what is not right before God, they feel that God no longer loves them, and if He still loves them, the love is not as strong as when they do good. Sometime we live everyday wondering if truly God will love us today, and we are so keen to do what seems right, so that we may earn more of His Love. Our lives are filled with self-righteousness instead of self-surrender to His Love. We strive so much to please Him. Some have gone into an extend of thinking God will always punish them because they fail to do what is right, and so they think the tough situation, sickness, struggles and pain are as a result of failing to please Him. It feels so sad, if we view God in such a manner. This is the reason we cant trust that God can Love us so unconditionally, we think His love can be bought by our good deeds.
I am a victim of self-righteousness. When i was a new believer, I was so passionate about God. I Loved Him so much, that i didn't what to do anything wrong.This was mainly because I thought that He would withdraw His Favor from me. I strived to please Him. At times, I couldn't even step on a cockroach, because i feared maybe that it would make Him sad!. I  was so opt to do what is right. I would spend hours praying, because I thought if i didn't He wouldn't bless me..I enjoyed  prayer time.
Albeit it got to a point where i was tired to striving to do things by my effort in order to earn His love. I was tired of  prayer as a duty but want sure if i stopped praying he still would love me. Many people around me thought i loved to pray. little did they know that i was under my self imposed obligation to do it. At some point i got tired with christian life though i keep trying to do what seemed right, so i could please God anyway. This went on until the time God in His mercies taught me of His love.I rested from my labors of trying to earn His love.
It has been a journey of understanding the Love of God.
We know from the scripture that God is Love,
1 John 4:8,16
[8]But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
[16]We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.

God is Love and Love is God, we cant separate the two. Love is a person, is not just feelings. If you wait to feel the love of God you will never feel it. I know that the Spirit of God can reveal God's love in a tangible way, and make it so real to your emotions, indeed it is real. You cant know His Love when you based it with emotions. As i have stated earlier that Love is a person. You experience Him to know Him. Have you ever loved a person? All you want is to talk to him them and spend time with them, and the more you know them and spend time with him, the more your love grows deeper for him. In this case, the more you spend time with God, the more you get to understand how much He loves you.
Let me slow down here, and make us understand from scriptures God loved us before we could think of Him.

Ephesians 1:4
[4]Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes.
In English we understand that the word 'Loved' is past tense.In this context therefore, it means that God already loved us even before we existed, and in that case even before he made the world.
John 3:16
[16]“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
For God loved us that He gave. We are the world he is talking about in this verse. There was nothing pleasing with us, we were lost ,people without hope. Yet at such a point where all we could do was evil and sin, he still loved us,(Eph 2.4-5).
How much more do you think He loves us now, since we are His sons? For He loved us when couldn't be loved, when we didn't do anything pleasing to Him. We belonged to the kingdom of darkness and that because of this the scripture says that, He has translated us from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of His dear son. For God who was and is Love, loved sinful and hopeless people. Wow that is crazy love! I urge us to stop thinking that we can earn His love now, we cannot. This because we didn't even earn it at first!
In all this we must know there was a price that was paid, a price that pleased God. A price that made us experience His Love.
We could never and u'll never understand how much He loves you, if you nature is not changed, and that is to believe in Jesus. U'll still struggle to believe in His love. I know even now most of us believer struggle to believe that He fully loves us.
Romans 5:5
[5]And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
He filled us with Himself, with Love, through the HolySpirit. So now we can identify with Him, we can experience Him in our lives because He has poured our His Love in our hearts.

The cross is the demonstration of God's love (Ephesians 5.8, 1 John 3.16). Love came to rescue us, from bondage of fear. From the old testament we could see how God dealt with the Israelite, how He punished them, how the law was tough and His commands were hard to keep. We have that view of God even today, that He is a 'tough' God. Indeed as He said, He is the same today, tomorrow and forever. He has never changed, and even in those days still He was God who is Love. His anger and judgement were demonstration of His Love. He loved the Israelite so much, as it is evident when He rescued them from the harsh labor into rest. In Hebrew it says that, God disciplines His children  because He love them, and they are legitimate sons.
We grew misunderstanding His Love, and we feared God, coz He was so 'tough'. We thank God, Christ came and satisfied the anger of God, He took all our punishment and made Him sin. The wrath of God was rested on Him. So that we may experience His Love and freedom. We can now approach Him with confidence,(Hebrews 4.16).
For He has not given us the Spirit of fear but of power, love and sound mind  (2 Timothy 1.7)
My childhood life was not filled with love, i always saw on TV, where the parent could treat their children with a lot of affection, how they will read story books before the children sleep. They could lavish a lot of kisses to the kids, telling them how much they are loved. I lacked that, my parent were good, but the African culture in them, they couldn't do that to us. Losing my parent at a tender age was a emotional blow for me. I seeked to be loved, i became so lonely and independent. I desired someone to just come and tell me how much they love me, but i lacked it. I cant describe how i felt, when i was a teenager and a certain boy came and said to me that, am beautiful and he loves me. I had sleepless night thinking how can he say that he loves me. I was excited, but at the same time i doubted if anyone could love me. I didn't experience love anywhere. I lived with low self-esteem, i couldn't even look at myself on the mirror. That is how broken i was as i grew up.

I receive Jesus Christ as my Lord, when i was 14 years back in 2011, a form 1 student. Wow at least i found a friend, but still i was not free from self-righteousness, i didn't know that He loves me always. It was when i joined campus and now God was teaching me about His Love. It was a transformation in my soul, i was free. I stop to seek love from people, for i found Love Himself. I became so free from myself and people, that i didn't mind if they love me or not. I was wrecked by His Divine Love. It was not a one day experience, but days of spending time with Him and allowing Him to love me. Sometime we fail to experience His Love, because we do not allow ourselves to be Loved. That is pride, surrender and rest in His Love.

Let go off you fears and experience His Love. Begin to seek His love from the scripture, have knowledge of His Love.
Ephesians 3:17
[17]Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong.
Its only His love that will keep you strong, as you continue to trust in Him, and get rooted in Christ.
You will never get real Love apart from God. You parent, your spouse, your children name them, will never love you as much as God does. People always desire something back, they do not love you for free. They seek also to be loved, but God loves you for who you are. Jesus our High priest, understand our weaknesses, coz He was tested in every way that He may help us in our weaknesses.
I believe all that people desire is to hear of His Love. Drug addicts, prostitutes, murders, sinner all are craving for love, they want acceptance and no one can truly deliver them apart from the Love of God. Even believers live everyday with condemnation and guilt of they past failures, but its only the Love of God that can sustain a christian in his daily life.
we have many struggles we fall time and time again. We feel like giving up, things can be tough and rough.
 Personally i have weaknesses and struggles, some i fear even to tell anyone, coz you do not know what they might think of you, they are quick to respond and judge, but when i remember of His love my fears fades, coz i am accepted and Loved. Its only His love that can set you free from any kind of struggle. Love is freedom.

LOVE IS GOD

Romans 8:38
[38]And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.
Indeed nothing can separate you from His, love.
As i conclude for this week my prayer is that we will desire to soaked by His Love. We cant fully know His love, coz it is so wide Ephesians 3.18-19. We cant fully comprehend it, but we can experience it in a new dimension everyday. No one can truly make you understand how much God loves you. He is the only one Who can reveal His Love for you through the Holy spirit.

Power points

• God is Love, and Love is God
• God loves you unconditionally
• He loves you when you were yet a sinner
• His Love is able to free you from your struggles
• Allow Him to Love you
• Nothing can separate you from His Love
• 
  

Prayer 

Dear God, thank you for loving us unconditionally. We now understand that we cant do anything to earn your love. For you loved us freely through Jesus. Thank you for you are Love and you have lavished love in our heart. Help us to always experience your love,and accept to be Loved by you. Thank you God.Amen 

NB. Any que,correction or comments are allowed.