The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace. 1 Pet. 4:7-10
Dear Lord Jesus, may Peter’s words sink and settle deep into my heart. If I really believed “the end of all things is at hand”—if I really believed your return could happen within my lifetime, it should make an obvious and radical difference, in how I live and love.
Whenever I attend a funeral, I always go away with a sense of my mortality and the fragility of life—at least for a couple of weeks. I hug loved ones a little tighter and linger a little longer in conversations; but then it’s “back to normal,” and the same harried pace takes over and the same broken patterns in relationships resume.
Normal sinners go on loving as normal sinners do: rather than covering sins, we get irritated with one another’s sins; rather than welcoming one another without grumbling, we guard our own space with complaining; rather than using your gifts to serve each other, we hoard your gifts to satisfy ourselves; rather than administering your multifaceted grace to one another, we withhold it from one another. Yet “the end of all things is near.” God, have mercy on me, the sinner.
Jesus, please bring the gospel to bear upon my heart in fresh and powerful ways—especially in my relationships. You’ve made it clear that the primary mark of discipleship is not how much we know, but how well we love (John 13:34-35).
I don’t want to love by guilt, but by grace. I don’t want to love by fear, but by faith. I don’t want to love with a view to another funeral, but with a view of your second coming. I don’t want to love to get anything from others, but because I’ve received everything in you.
You’re the one who loves us deeply. You’re the one who has covered not just a multitude but all of our sins. You’re the one who always offers us hospitality without grumbling. You’re the one who’s always serving us and giving us more grace, in all its forms. Live in us and love through us, whether you return in fifteen minutes or fifteen hundred years. So very Amen we pray, in your faithful and compassionate name.
