We were reading in church this morning from Colossians 3, particularly the passage that says
'Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.'
So we need to clothe ourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. And put on love.That is great to read, sounds good until you start to actually think about what it means practically. How does it impact on my daily life. What would the world look like if we all lived like this, thinking about the effect that our actions have on other people. What does it mean to be compassionate, kind, humble, gentle and peaceful? I don't think anyone who was listening to the message this morning could go away without thinking that there was something that they needed to change in the way they live or relate to people. Probably there were as many different reactions as there were people present. What did I learn? That I am rubbish at humility. Am I willing to accept being thought badly of for the sake of Jesus. Do I worry when people misunderstand my motives? Do I want to justify why I have done things so that people understand and think I'm a nice person. What I need to learn is that the only one who needs to know my motivations is the one who already knows them. I don't need to justify myself to people if I am doing the right thing, whether they know it or not.And I probably need to work on the other parts of the passage too!