Devos Catch Up - Love Rejoices with the Truth, Always Protects, Always Hopes

 Love Rejoices with the Truth - Hannah

Hannah led this devotion and was glad she had “Rejoices with the truth” because Joy is her favorite fruit of the Spirit and one she demonstrates well. She shared 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Hannah shared that sometimes we focus on finding God’s will in our life, but his will is for us to rejoice always. ALWAYS. Do we have a spiritual joy inside of us all the time? That doesn’t mean we’re happy all the time. Happy and joy aren’t synonymous. Happiness is temporary - a feeling. Joy is an attitude - an action. We have to choose joy. She also shared Psalms 16:11 “In your presence there is fullness of joy.” This summer Hannah did a word study on Joy in the Bible and looked up everywhere that joy was mentioned. She had this verse written on her board because it reminded her that nothing can give her joy except for being in Christ’s presence. If she’s spending time with Him, she will find joy. She also shared Philippians 1:18 “…And I will continue to rejoice in your presence.” - We will continue to rejoice even in a hard time. And Hannah mentioned that in James 1:2 it says hard times actually produce joy -  “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you face trials of many kinds…” She said she remembered a teacher even mentioning they pray for hard times because they know in those moments they bring her closer to Christ. Finally she shared the verse that we could/should probably recite every day to focus on a joyful mindset, Psalm 118:24 “This is the day that the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it.”

Love Always Protects - Dylan

Dylan shared 2 Samuel 22:3-4, “My God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation. He is my stronghold, my refuge and my savior—from violent people you save me.” Dylan mentioned that love protects in three ways:

1. Physically - Love provides an environment that protects, keeps their loved ones out of bodily harm. 
2. Emotionally - Love understands the sensitive emotions of others - In 2 Thessalonians 3:3 it says “But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen you and protect you from the evil one.” Something we can practically do is pray for the Lord to protect the hearts and minds of our loved ones from attacks from the evil one. 
3. Value - Dylan shared the example of a $5. Even if you fold it and crumple it up, it still maintains it’s value. The same happens with us as humans, even when we make mistakes or mess up, God still looks at us with value because he loves us. We should do the same for others. 

Take away: Just like God loves and protects us, we should love and protect others physically, emotionally, and their value. 

Love Always Hopes - Jose

Jose shared Romans 15:13, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Jose shared that maintaining hope isn’t a simple thing we can understand, sometimes it is hard to maintain hope, but we can do it because hope comes from God. He’s the God of hope. If we lose hope it is like telling him we’re rejecting him. We can only find hope by spending time with Him. But the good news is, like Dylan said yesterday, no matter what, even if we feel like we are losing hope, we don’t lose our value in God’s eyes. What we can do to increase our Hope is spend more time with Him.