Loving our neighbors

"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 neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”    Matthew 22:36-40


Megan, a friend who is living with us for a couple of months, challenged me with the idea of raising our daughter to live to give.   It is a total mind shift but I believe a biblical one.  "You shall love your neighbor as yourself", is pretty far reaching.  I have to admit that I do a lot more for myself than those who have greater needs around me.  So in a small way we began to love our neighbors.  We needed bread so we made some for us and some for our neighbors.  Calissa had a blast and talked about her little friends next door and across the street who were going to receive the bread.  We made it a little more special than usual.   

 I need to get a food marker to draw eyes on next time. 

On a little more serious note, I have been thinking a lot about the way we live for awhile. 
I have curtains, a couch, plenty of food, toilet paper etc.  There are many around the world who are dying from lack of food and I have the ability to help if I were to love them... I could go with a lot less so that they might have life.  I know I can't afford to feed all the hungry in the world but I can feed some, I can love some.  What if I spent just as much on others as I do myself?  

Temptation

In learning about Jesus' temptation in the wilderness, we wanted our daughter to understand what temptation is, and what it feels like.

Our daughter loves ice cream more than anyone I have ever known.  She can hardly contain herself with it so it was the perfect way for her to feel tempted.

We put blueberries and ice cream in front of her and told her not to eat the ice cream but she could have the blueberries.  We then left the room and watched from where she couldn't see us.  She poked  the ice cream with her fork but eventually put it down and ate the blueberries.  It was a great way to talk about temptation.  After that we read the story of Jesus temptation in the wilderness from the bible (NIrV), using felts to illustrate.  Although, I must admit that our daughter now thinks Jesus was offered ice cream instead of bread...

We then talked about how Jesus and His words (Jesus answered temptation with the word of God, nothing else) help us to beat temptation.

"For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted."  Heb. 2:18


The next morning for breakfast she got an ice cream breakfast with a little real ice cream (on the side) too.  

More food ideas from friends

could use for the story of Samson or Jonathan

Jonah, fishermen turned fishers of men, or the coin found in the fish's mouth are some options

Noah's ark

Dove:  came to Noah, came down after Jesus' baptism

Raven fed Elijah

Angel:  Zachariah visited by, Mary visited by, Shepherds.... lots of options