God is love

Our creator God – whether you choose to acknowledge Him or not – is Love, with a capital “L.” Love is His idea. Love is His nature. Love is His gift to us.

Just as a parent loves his children, God desires for His children their best, their highest — and — their love in return. However, God does not withdraw His love from those He created when they choose to turn their backs on Him. Instead, He continues to stretch out His hands to us. He has pity on us for He knows that we are all — all — sinners, incapable of helping ourselves.

Enter Jesus: God’s answer to our need for “God-in-skin,” one who can completely identify with our struggles, and yet remain without sin. The perfect substitute – sacrifice, reconciler – to provide the means for us to receive God’s love and return it to Him!

No, homosexuality is not a sin any bigger or worse or more worthy of condemnation than other “minor” sins (humanly speaking). But the fact remains that God’s design for humankind, from the very Genesis of time, is for marriage between one man and one woman. Culture may rebel against that restriction, but that does not remove it from God’s plan.

The Bible abounds with stories of opportunities for change, for repentance, for forgiveness, for grace which holds arms open wide to all who will come. Come as you are! Let God’s love for you melt away your rebellion. Let God’s love for you overwhelm you to the point that you, weeping for your turning away from Him, will return rejoicing to Him who has a life of abundance to shower upon you!

Could anything be more wonderful than this unconditional love for you from God, the creator of the entire universe? Why settle for anything less?

— Anne J. Palmer

Salisbury

Remembering Jeffery

I wanted to thank you for the very touching article about Jeffery Hooker passing away this week. Shavonne did an amazing job with her article of describing Jeff and how he touched so many lives. We just recently moved to Salisbury and live next door to Betty Peeler and the many thoughtful things he has done for both Mrs. Peeler an our family were amazing. We will miss him a lot and I am sad we did not get to know him better.

— Fred Schmidt

Salisbury