From today’s reading...
‘No one can have greater love than to lay down his life for his friends.’” John 15:13
When Jesus said this, it’s obvious that He meant literally dying for one another, as He was about to do for us because He always leads by example.
What’s less obvious is the additional meaning of laying down one’s life.
A young woman giving up a business career to be a loving mother and wife is an example of laying down one’s life.
A young man giving up his partying ways to be a loving father and husband is another example, as is a young man or woman giving up a lucrative business career to enter the religious life.
War heroes are immortalized in movies for laying down their lives in dramatic fashion, and rightly so.
Now let’s give credit to the single mom who literally never gets a break for weeks on end because she knows the dangers that lurk out there, and she is committed to providing for her children so their lives are better than hers.
Let’s give credit to the single dad who has 60% of his paycheck taken out by the vindictive ex-wife who has society, the courts, and her rich new husband on her side to take his kids away forever unless he “plays ball” on her field with her rules. So he works two jobs and never says a bad word about her when he gets to spend time with his kids.
Let’s give credit to the man who gets up a 4 am and commutes an hour each way to and from work, and takes every overtime shift he can, so his wife and children can sleep in and spend their days together rather than farm them out to daycare.
Your great love enables you to...
Stay the course.
Keep the faith.
Endure.
Market like you mean it. Now go sell something.