Loving and Living Well Hebrews 10:24

Hebrews 10:24 (NIV)
24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.

In this verse we are being encouraged to “consider how to spur one another on toward love and good deeds”. In Hebrews 10:23 we talked about Biblical hope. This amazing hope that we have should impact our daily lives in significant ways. It should shape the way that we face and engage each day. Our daily lives should be bringing glory to God. Do you ever think about your hopes for the day? About how your life can have an impact for the Kingdom of God? How you might be able to encourage or bless the people around you?

Perhaps you haven’t been thinking like that. You just get up and go through the motions to make it through another day. If that is descriptive of your life then I would suggest that you are cutting yourself off from the incredible adventure that God has called you to and that you are missing out on opportunities to experience grace, mercy, joy and even the power of God in your daily life.

You were not created to just make it through. That is subhuman. To be more fully human is to embrace the day and seek the Lord and look for Him in the moment as you press into and yield to Holy Spirit.

Verse 24 really should be one of the major goals of your daily life.

Hebrews 10:24 (NIV)
24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.

As we dive into this verse let’s first talk about love and good deeds. I like to think of this as loving well and living well. Loving God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and loving your neighbor as you love yourself. This is an all in love. And I believe living well is best defined as living by doing the next right thing.

As you meditate on verse 24 you also need to notice something very important. It is not just exhorting us to love well and live well. It is exhorting us to help others to live like this. We are to spur one another on toward love and good deeds. We are to focus on helping others become loving people who are living by doing the next right thing. Let me emphasize that. The goal of our daily lives is not just loving well and living by doing the next right thing but helping to stir up others to love and live well. We are to be actively engaged with considering how to do this. We are to look at one another, think about one another, focus on one another, care about one another, and on and on. And the result of this considering is to come up with ways to spur them to loving well and living well.

Let’s consider some verses to help us learn to live like this.

1 John 4:11 (NIV)
11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

1 Peter 4:10 (NIV)
10 Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.

1 Thessalonians 5:15 (NIV)
15 Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else.

Ephesians 4:32 (NIV)
32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

Hebrews 3:13 (NIV)
13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.

Colossians 3:13 (NIV)
13 Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.

When you start your day, think about how you might live this day in ways that would motivate others to love well and live well. If you begin to live like that, your days will never be boring. Every day will be new and different as you press in to living in and for Him in ways that make a difference in the world around us.

Steve Lawes is the founder of the Online Bible Institute and Pastor of Keys Vineyard Church.