The God Initiative
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.“ John 13:34 ESV
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Laws and the Prophets.” Matthew 22:36-40 ESV
What is the God Initiative?
It’s simple, it’s the heart of God, his love gene, the core of his being. It’s the reason we are recipients of salvation from Jesus dying on the cross for all of humanity. It’s this: Love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and all your mind. Then, love your neighbour as yourself. It’s a continuation and extension from loving God to loving man.
Love is better than sacrifice, love is stronger than hate. It’s the strongest weapon we can release. Love rebuilds devastation more swiftly than man’s organizational strategies. Unity of the brothers in Christ is the sweetest incense to the kingdom of heaven. It fills the earth with the expansion of God’s goodness, grace, hope and faith.
The Body of Christ becomes the most powerful entity on earth when we unite, when we become one, and when we love our neighbor as ourselves. The prayer of Jesus’s heart was in John 17, which is to make us one.
The question is, who is your neighbour? Have we narrowed the playing field of our neighbour? Jesus governed through the unification of the Body of Christ. Jews and Gentiles both sat at His table side by side. He merged them together to serve as one to begin the manifestation of the Great Commission.
The first and greatest commandment of our Father, is love God and love your neighbor as yourself! Question, who is your neighbor? Love is patient, love is kind, it’s not puffed up, it puts others before ourselves.
Part of the God Initiative is to experience the “Upper Room.” The key to the move of the Holy Spirit was not solely their tongues of fire. But the true movement of the Spirit lied within that fire. The secret essence of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit was that each one HEARD the other speaking in their own language. They embraced and reflected the vocalization of another foreign culture, its nuances and perspectives. During this moment they grasped the heart and spirit of their brothers among them.
Have you stopped to hear, understand and empathize with your sisters and brothers in Christ who operate in a different function that makes the Body of Christ whole?
How can you participate in the God Initiative?
1. Go and visit a church where you wouldn’t usually ever attend and worship with them.
2. Listen to how your heart and soul can become agitated or separated from hearing the gospel because of your tradition or unfamiliarity sets in.
3. Be still and ask God why He calls them friend. What nature do they display that looks like Him?
4. Repent for building walls of separation in the House of God.
5. Pray and ask for wisdom on how you can build bridges of unity within the family of
God. Let joy and love be your building blocks.
”And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:30-31 ESV