Bible Snack #84

​And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also (1 John 4:21).
 
All of us have little tricks that we use with ourselves. Mine is singing. I make up a little song to help me overcome whatever obstacle is in my path, and then I sing it over and over. Like if I’m having a problem with a certain person and I want that discord to go away, I sing, “I love everybody, and everybody loves me.” I can make up an infinite number of melodies to go along with those words. And it works. I don’t know why; all I know is that I don’t have to do anything beyond that in order to be at peace with that certain person. I do that with my writing, with my income, with book sales, with health issues, you name it—I sing it away.
 
It probably works because I take my words from the Bible, or at least ones that agree with the Bible. It’s the same thing as making what we Christians call confessions. We confess that we love our brother, and if we say it often enough, it happens. I simply prefer singing my confessions.
 

There will always be those who take issue with us and won’t be mollified by any effort on our parts, but our hearts can be clear because we love everybody! As one of our pundits said: “You can please 80% of the people most of the time, but you’ll never please 100% of the people at any time.”  In other words, we can get 80% of the people to drop their grievances with us, but that 20% will hang back. Don’t worry about them. They’re God’s problem. You are your problem, so make sure your heart is right with God.