Before we signed on the dotted line, I wanted to read all the policies and procedures of the children’s ministry. Again, this was a decision I made as a parent, not necessarily as a christian. I wanted the best for my child, and at that time, for me, the best meant fun, love, games and awesomeness. Little did I know that I was going to change my mind after reading that seemingly innocuous document.

Within the several pages long printout, I found a reference to ‘Growing Kids Gods Way’ or GKGW for short. For those of you unfamiliar, this is a christian curriculum created by Gary and Ann Marie Ezzo, the authors of the celebrated secular book, Babywise. I was a stay at home mom at this time, and with only one little one, under 6 mos, I had a great deal of time on my hands. I was volunteering at WIC (Women In Children, the government-sponsored program, a part of the Department of Agriculture, that gives out cheese, peanut butter, milk and cereal to impoverished women) as a breastfeeding counselor. I mentioned this program to my WIC sponsor and she let me know quickly that WIC abhorred this ‘movement’. As I sat in her office, she told me of children who had been hospitalized due to dehydration that she directly attributed that to this practice. As I looked closer at the materials, I saw that GKGW had their mothers adhere to a strict feeding schedule from birth, even breastfeeding mothers… In other words, with a feeding practice that relied on feeding children ‘on demand’, GKGW was encouraging mothers to absolutely refuse to feed hungry children.

In case you are unaware, all babies go through growth spurts at 3, 6, and 9 weeks and again at 3, 6 and 9 months. This is one of the tidbits I learned from the years at WIC and the years at La Leche League. If a breastfed child is not allowed to eat at these times, according to his/her desires, the mother will not make enough milk. Women make milk in response to demand, and if the baby is unable to show demand, through nursing at will, the mother will never make enough milk. We saw dozens of women ‘dry up’ due to the practice of scheduled feedings at WIC, and that was in less than a year in a small town!

Now, I will admit to being a breastfeeding Nazi. It took me 4 straight weeks of trying to get it right, so I was just about as determined/stubborn as you could possibly be. If you search for the term, breastfeeding Nazi, and my name, you’ll see someone graciously added me to a list on the web of breastfeeding Nazis. I’ve participated in sit-ins, breastfeeding in public places, and challenged every law that in any way encroaches on a woman’s right to feed her child (thank you to La Leche Leage for the amazing empowerment!), so I know I’m biased and I’m stating that fact very clearly. I believe that God gave us an amazing way to bond and nourish our children, and if at all possible, I hope everyone gives it a try. Of course, I know there are some darn good reasons for not breastfeeding, and please don’t think I’ll ever judge you for making a decision (just don’t judge me for making the decision I did). Hopefully this won’t turn into a breast vs. bottle debate. Some people choose not to, some people try their darndest and can’t, and some people are lucky enough to get to enjoy this sweet experience. None of this makes us, in any way, better mothers, more loved by our children, nor do we have smarter kids. I think that’s all bunk! Let’s just say we all have our own ways of feeding and loving our kids, and I’ve loved the heck out of my nephew feeding him a bottle by the way, so let’s all just get along… and I think that’s enough said about that.

Anyway, back to the story. When I learned about this ‘scheduled feeding’ mess, I was angry, but I knew the right course of action was to make an appointment with the Pastor and tell him what I knew. In my young, naive brain, I thought he would welcome my insight and immediately pull this disastrous curriculum immediately. Now, I admit, I really set myself up for defeat.

My husband and I met with him, and while he listened, you could quickly tell he was bored to tears and a bit annoyed with this interruption from his studies. Within minutes he interrupted us, me actually, and said that his children survived the curriculum and I shouldn’t worry my pretty little head about it. We excused ourselves, defeated, and decided that obviously we were too weird to fit in at a normal church. We literally walked out with our heads down and tears welling in our eyes. Weeks went by, sad, and broken. It’s disheartening to know that you are alone in the world, and after that conversation I surely felt that way. Was I some hippie that just couldn’t fit in? Was I wrong? Did children really need to be denied food because it was sinful of them to intrude upon our time (directly from the Ezzos, by the way)? Was God ‘ignoring’ Jesus on the cross when he said ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (again, directly from Growing Kids Gods Way)? Was I completely off base?

Weeks later, as I was listening to talk radio (yes I admit to a serious addiction to talk radio), there was commercial for a local church that was just starting. The Pastor was a man with a very, very southern drawl (and for those of you who’ve heard me talk, you know that if I say someone sounds ‘southern’, then they darn well sound southern!), and talked about his church with a passion for the Word and a commitment to truth. Not wanting to waste even a minute getting my heart broken again, I called the church office after the commercial. I was immediately put through to the Pastor, who was more than willing to speak with a mere woman, and he encouraged us to visit. I told him our our recent dilemma and he said, “Well, I don’t know much about that curriculum”, with a slow voice, “but I can’t imagine that I’d allow something like that to be taught at our church.” He cared enough to listen, even to me, and after I got off the phone with him, I immediately called my husband at work to tell him I’d found a church for us.

We visited for a few weeks, and though this was a young church, meeting at a school, we knew quickly that this was the church that God had been saving us for. After 2 weeks, we had to be out for a season, because my 8 month old daughter had Salmonella and was hospitalized for over a week (another story, don’t get me started), but as soon as we were able to come back again, we gratefully joined the church. In fact, my daughter sat in service with us, and I was nursing her under a blanket when we were asked to come forward to join. We walked up, daughter still nursing under said blanket, and greeted everyone in front of the church after professing our desire to be a part of the body. Of course, I did have one older gentleman peek to see the baby and then turn away completely scarlet, LOL, but we were absolutely welcomed with open arms into that church. I ended up serving in the children’s ministry, first as a PreK teacher, and later as the Director of PreK, and we stayed at that church until God called us to pastor a church a few hundred miles away, in Brunswick, GA. Since then I’ve been the Director of Children’s Ministry or the Directory of PreK at every church I’ve been honored to be called to. Of course, since my husband is now a Pastor, I go where we’re called, and that instance in Savannah was the last time I’ve been privileged enough to ‘choose a church’, but at each church we’ve served at, I’m content in the Lord. From GA, to VA, to CA, we’ve been lots of places, but where God calls, we go.

That church wasn’t perfect, there was a time when I was called in by the same pastor to be told that nursing, even under a blanket, was making others uncomfortable, and would I like to use the bathroom to nurse? You can imagine my angry, self-righteous response (would you eat your lunch in a bathroom?-ick), but even through all that, I knew I was in a church that loved me, my family and the Lord. Through everything, that church smothered us with love and I credit that Pastor and his flock with leading me to a full and real relationship with the Lord. Jesus became real to me there, he wasn’t just a kind man, but was the son of the Almighty Lord, and even in times of strife within that church, most of us absolutely loved the Lord and that’s enough for me.

So yes, children’s ministry changed my life. Not in the normal way, but it changed it, and I’m a better person because of it.

Its mantra (if I can help it, no organization that I’m affiliated with has a mission statement) is to “train the trainers”— that is, pastors, ministers, deacons, elders, etc. Twice a year it runs a conference featuring some of the best Christian speakers. If you like to watch and hear the sessions from this Fall’s conference, click here.

Guy’s blog is one of my daily stops while preparing for my blogs at Sleepyblogger and at Gamingandtech, but this was a great resource for anyone interested in church matters.

Nothing can erase that thing you did that makes you feel so yucky and dirty. You can’t go back and make it like it never happened.

You can be forgiven. You can apologize to the people you hurt. You can promise to never do it again, but you can’t take it back.

Hearts will heal
They’re resilient
Pain will lessen
Time heals all wounds

But you can’t take it back
Trust me
I know it all to well

See I’ve done just as bad a thing as you
And nothing can make it gone
It’s a shameful part of my history

I can’t take back
I wish I could, But I can’t

But, it doesn’t define me
And, my sin has been forgiven
I can’t make it right
But He has made ME righteous

ReliantK – Who I am Hates Who I’ve been

I watched the proverbial sunrise
Coming up over the pacific
And you might think I’m losing my mind
But I will shy away from the specifics
Cause I don’t want you to know where I am
Cause then you’ll see my heart in the saddest state it’s ever been
And this is no place to try to live my life

Stop right there
That’s exactly where I lost it
See that line
Well, I never should have crossed it
Stop right there
Well I never should’ve said that
It’s the very moment that I wish that I could take back

I’m sorry for the person I became
I’m sorry that it took so long for me to change
I’m ready to be sure
I never become that way again
Cause who I am hates who I’ve been
Who I am hates who I’ve been

I talked to absolutely no one
Coudn’t keep to myself enough
And the things bottled inside had finally begun
To create so much pressure that I’d soon blow up

And I heard the reverberating footsteps
Syncing up to the beating of my heart
And I was positive that unless
I got myself together I would watch me fall apart

And I can’t let that happen again
Cause then you’ll see my heart in the saddest state it’s ever been
And this is no place to live my life

Who I am hates who I’ve been
And who I am will take the second chance you gave me
Who I am hates who I’ve been
Cause who I’ve been only ever made me

The book novelization of the film was handled by Angela Hunt, author of over one hundred books, most of which are historical or contemporary novels targeted at women. How well this book represents the film I will not be able to say until I have seen it. If it is a true adaptation I believe I will enjoy the film a great deal. I began reading this book with great skepticism but found myself enjoying it all the way until I had turned the final page. It will not win any Pulitzer Prizes, but is still well-written and enjoyable, even though it feels that perhaps it was rushed just a little bit. Hunt clearly dedicated a good deal of time to understanding Jesus’ cultural context and these details add a fascinating dimension to a story we all know so well.

Looks like a good book and a good movie. We’ll probably see it on DVD.

However, I hesitate to recommend these ‘christian’ movies because so many people choose to ‘feel their faith’ with these feel good movies rather than living it… Doesn’t mean I don’t think the movie won’t be good, but let’s face it, 1-you’re not going to win crowns for watching this movie and checking it off your goodie-goodie list and 2-there will be very, very few people who come to faith via this christian-focused movie.

Again, NOTHING wrong with watching movies like this, however, let’s not try to buy out the theater this time.

I swear if I have one more christian tell me that Facing the Giants was a moving experience for them, I think I’ll croak. Football is a religion for some, and I know the temptation is there to build your worship plans right into the sport, but c’mon!

I know that as a Pastor’s wife I hear the butt-end of church business sometimes, and I’d be a liar if I didn’t tell you that I do feel resentment from time to time. However, as I read again of Christ’s love for the church I’m reminded of how I’m supposed to love the church. While it’s easy to throw my hands up and declare I’m more effective without this ‘business’ end of God’s work, I know that part of my calling is to uplift His church and serve Him through my service within her body.

I feel like I’m in a prison sometimes, honestly, as I have to walk out of a room where people are talking about me and my husband and walk into a room where I must teach a lesson of forgiveness or of pride or of gossip. But I DO know that it’s not really a prison if I can walk out of it tomorrow… and I can. A prisoner is not where they are voluntarily, but against their will, and with God, thankfully, we have free will to serve Him or to deny Him.

I choose to be where I am, serving and teaching with love (true love) for those I know will soon see the error of their ways and repent. I know these ladies and I really do believe their hearts will soon be turned and their harmful-to-the-body-words will cease.

I can’t let these ladies, church politics or anything stop me from choosing to serve within the Lord’s church. I love Him enough to love His bride.

From Derek Webb:

Lyrics to Love His Church

i have come with one purpose
to capture for myself a bride
by my life she is lovely
by my death she’s justified

i have always been her husband
though many lovers she has known
so with water i will wash her
and by my word alone

so when you hear the sound of the water
you will know you’re not alone

(chorus)
cause i haven’t come for only you
but for my people to pursue
you cannot care for me with no regard for her
if you love me you will love the church

i have long pursued her
as a harlot and a whore
but she will feast upon me
she will drink and thirst no more

so when you taste my flesh and my blood
you will know you’re not alone
(chorus)

there is none that can replace her
though there are many who will try
and though some may be her bridesmaids
they can never be my bride
(chorus)

Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.

Could it be that sodomy should refer to arrogant hearts that refuse to help the poor? Is homosexuality the ‘sin of Sodom’? Sure, we know they practiced it, and God calls it out as a sin they were guilty of, but do we elevate it’s importance by saying it is THE reason Sodom was destroyed.

Before you shoot back from the hip, I implore you to re-read the section where Sodom’s demise is discussed in the bible (Genesis 12-19) with these thoughts in mind. Notate in your bible when homosexual sex is discussed and when other sin is pointed out.

I think your faith is important enough that it DESERVES your reflection. Don’t be afraid to ask questions…

*Side note, I still have difficulty forgiving Lott for his quick offering of his virgin daughters to be gang-raped by an angry mob to save the two angels. It really bugs me.

Is Homosexuality A Sin? The Bible says this:

Lev 18:22
“Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.” – NIV

1 Cor 6:9
“Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders” – NIV

Rom 1:26-27
“Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.” – NIV

I won’t debate you on whether or not homosexuality is a sin. However, I submit to you that the church’s hatred of homosexuals is as great a sin, as that oh-so-detested-by-Christians-sin. Heck, it’s actually more harmful if we can agree that the greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself.

In our haste to brand the homosexual as so deviant as to top all other sins (when no sin is supposed to be greater than another), we show our own black hearts and communicate to the world that we truly do not love others.

What does this bumper sticker communicate to churchgoers? Now, to the unchurched?

Would a gay person feel welcomed by you if he saw your sticker at the grocery store? Is this going to make him feel like you care about him? Will he ask you about Jesus?

We don’t have to worry about being hated for our faith, we’re making sure we are hated for our lack of love. Here are my questions to you:

What is the last thing you said about homosexuality?
Did you say it as if you were talking about a friend or :gasp: an enemy?
If a homosexual knew what you said about him would it make him feel comfortable enough to share with you any pain he are experiencing?
Has your church created an environment of love that outsiders know would welcome homosexuals?

Next up: Why I could never vote for the marriage amendment.

Toys for Tots had decided that Jesus dolls are not appropriate gifts for submission:

We can’t take a chance on sending a talking Jesus doll to a Jewish family or a Muslim family.

However, it looks like Christians came out of the woodwork to lam-blast a decision that was probably the right one:

Breaking News

The Talking Jesus doll issue has been resolved. Toys for Tots has found appropriate places for these items. We have notified the donor of our willingness to handle this transaction.

Guys, can we pick our battles please? We just look like morons when we fight for our right to gift a Jesus doll. Get a grip…

This is exactly why most of us deserve the whole, ‘shoving Christ down my throat’ gripes. We’ve earned them.

Of course, that makes this crack from Mark Driscoll cut all the worse:

It is not uncommon to meet pastors’ wives who really let themselves go; they sometimes feel that because their husband is a pastor, he is therefore trapped into fidelity, which gives them cause for laziness.

We, as christian bloggers, have a responsibility to remember that more than the ‘flock’ are reading your blog. How do you think the secular world saw this statement? Yeah, he clarified after that statement that only Haggard was responsible for his sin, but why include this if you don’t think it’s a factor?

Here’s some comments from unbelievers on this statement:

1. Those fundies never fail to amaze me with something new everyday…to fill me with disgust at their close-minded, stupid, bigoted, hateful views. The US should declare war on our own hatemongering fundie terrorists before they can wreak more damage on this country.

2. Only a fundamentalist Christian could come up with such a convoluted excuse as “My fat ugly wife didn’t like sex and wouldn’t **** ** **** or ** **** so I became a gay drug addict”.

3. these right wing religious wackos are priceless. The only people more sickening than their leaders are the morons who go worship them every Sunday, instead of God! I’m sure Pastor Haggard wil be entering rehab any day now. Will it be drugs, liquor or sexual addiction.

4. Beyond that, as a woman, I wouldn’t go NEAR Mark Driscoll. Doesn’t he know that when he blames the wife for the husband’s sins that that will give some nut in the congregation an excuse to bash her around or verbally abuse her if she doesn’t shape up and keep him from prostitutes? This isn’t only dumb talk, it can be dangerous..religious furvor can be a very dangerous thing.

5. dumb dumb sheep afraid to think for themselves – take a 1200 yr old book literally.

6. Ted Haggard’s disgrace is that he turned away from the teachings of Christ. We all know that Jesus’ primary concerns were gay marriage and abortion. The meek shall inherit the earth? Afterthought. Easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man to get into heaven? Misquote. Blessed are the peacemakers? Not when there’s Middle Eastern oil at stake. When Haggard’s former evangelical friends castigate him for his sins, they will dountless omit the only one of which he was guilty. Hypocracy.

7. Church is a business, plain and simple. The more members, the more money. The more attractive, (Christ-like, perfect, ideal), a church and its members appear to outsiders, the more members it will attain and retain. Mrs. Haggard and and the other long-suffering wives of closeted gay pastors (and that has to be half, the other half being pedophiles

8. It seems as if the pastor is suffering from the Adam syndrome, “That woman you gave me.” Since he likes to quote Scriptures, here is one especially for him: Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well. Let thou fountains be blessed: and rejoice with the WIFE of thy youth. LET HER BE AS THE LOVING HIN AND PLEASANT ROE; LET HER BREAST SATISY THEE AT ALL TIMES; AND BE THOU RAVISHED ALWAYS WITH HER LOVE,” Proverbs 6: 15, 18, 19. When God sent Samuel to annnoint a King from Jessie’s house, God reminded Samuel to not look at the outward appearance, but to look at the heart. Also, the pastor’s wife is the mother of five children, and she takes care of the children and him and the congregation, so when does she have time to be lazy, and he should look at her heart, especially since she now has to look at him because of the mess he has created for her and her children and her family. The pastor who feels that its the wife’s fault should stay in the word, and he will have less time to condemn someone else’s wife.

9. Thank you, Mr. Goldstein, for bringing all this to light. Even though it’s easily the most nauseating, disgusting thing I’ve seen in a veritable smorgasbord of nauseating, disgusting things emanating from the Red party in the last few years. WHAT is WRONG with these people??

10. All forms of religion, not just Christianity, should be discouraged. We need logic and reason, not fantasy beliefs in gods and miracles. One needs only to study the past to see how religous quackery has contributed to man’s still primative state.
Learn to think.

11. Join the crowd of the human race and get off your high horse of moral superiority because another religious leader is a hypocrite. Spare me the crap that every church and every religious leader is about money. Let me see how many churches are in America and how many pastors are there? Every one of these are hypocritical? How this different than a prejudicial comment about all Jews or all blacks? We learn one thing. God is not religion and Jesus is not Christianity. Humans screw it up. Big news.

12. Isn’t it good to know that pastors have such a spiritual outlook on marriage?

13. Blame the victim, because a good Christian never could do anything wrong on his own.

14. What a bunch of misogynistic, “blame the victim” hypocrites. On a lark, I went to “Pastor” Driscoll’s blogsite – truly another world. First of all, you cannot get an account to comment unless you’d attended some Mars Hill Church seminar. Second, the weirdness just continued – “thanks for your insight” comments without a trace of irony. Your right, David; these people are like rock stars – drunk on power, “entitled” to having fawning, brainless followers, (all Dead Heads excepted), and constantly needing the adulation of their church members to feed their pitifully fractured egos. May they all be crushed under the weight of their dysfunction.

15. OF COURSE his wife is to blame!! “Christian” men have been blaming women for their faults and especially sexual misdeeds for centuries. All you have to do is read the Bible where there are countless examples of “evil” women who caused the downfall of, well, the human race (oh, I mean “mankind.”) Eve anyone??

16. Today I had the pleasure of throwing my bible in the dump. No longer will I be associated with anything with a hint of religion. Religion is the root of all evil.

17. Let me understand the good clerics point. If I let myself go my husband will become a gay drug addict. Gosh I had no idea I had that sort of power. The theory that I can turn my husband’s sexual orientation to the hetro or gay position based on what my scale says is amazing. I wonder what I do to make him like Fat Tire beer rather than Redhook. What he seems to be saying is that the husband is a creature without a mind of his own. Thank God I am not married to a christian pastor. I like my husband, I don’t want a creature I can manipulate with a fork.

18. Evangelical Christians and fundamentalist Moslems sound so much alike; notice how they demonize women. It’s a woman’s fault if they stray.

Those were the cleanest responses I could pull. If you think you can handle it, you should consider reading the rest of the comments. It’s important to see how unbelievers think, especially if you are so far removed from the world that you don’t remember…

Driscoll’s comments were out of line. I mean, they made me mad, and I’ve been a believer for 10 years. What was he implying even bringing up at all a wife’s appearance in this? So, if I get fat then my husband might cheat on me? Fat people have no hope, huh? Is this really the image we want to project as christians? “Yeah, I love you and all, but you’re fat so I’m outta here.”

We are the same people who want to define marriage, but they don’t want to include unconditional (or as close as we can get to it) love it in? Tomorrow I’m going to shock alot of you with my views on homosexuality. I’ll go ahead and say I agree with the Bible, so you can breathe a little now, but I hope you have time to come back and see what I have to say tomorrow.

1. I walk into a store and a person quickly seeks me out to pray for her friend, and then goes on to quickly insert that her friend is deep in sin because of ‘blah blah blah’.

2. A lady friend calls me to ask me to pray for her sister, ‘who is emotionally disturbed’ because she doesn’t agree with the sister on a petty issue.

3. A woman at my daughter’s school let’s it slip that she knows our family is on financial assistance at school.

4. A small group of dedicated naysayers are attempting to undermine a ministry within our church, well, two ministries actually, but are doing so as a misguided attempt to bring the ministries to health. Were these men and women to pray and read the Word, they’d see that the ministries are indeed healthy, but their gossip is starting to take it’s toll.

I’ve been very discouraged in this past week to see the level of gossip in my midst. I go out of my way to avoid it, to the point of telling people that they need to be quiet when I am handed gossip, so if I am hearing it how much more so are people, who don’t fear it, falling victim to it’s subversive damage?

Gossip, whether in the guise of ‘praying for a friend’ or ‘constructive criticism to all but the party involved’ is a sin.

From Psalm 50:19-20: “You give your mouth to evil. Your tongue frames deceit. You sit and speak against your brother. You slander your own mother’s son.”

From Proverbs 11:
9 The loose tongue of the godless spreads destruction; the common sense of the godly preserves them.

13 A gadabout gossip can’t be trusted with a secret, but someone of integrity won’t violate a confidence.

We are supposed to be a family, but increasingly it seems believers are less and less concerned with the hearts of those around them. Oh, we know our rules, and we are careful not to work on Sunday (though the original Sabbath was Saturday) and we are double-sure not to curse out loud (egads), but we tear down our friends, our family, to make ourselves look good, and then we delude ourselves into thinking we are ‘better than those darn homosexuals and heathens who are going straight to hell!’.

The whole mess makes me weak with spiritual exhaustion. Any sin separates us from God (Isiaih 59:1-2). Gossip, adultery, homosexuality, provoking your children to anger, losing your temper, murder, rape, stealing, lying, abortion, not honoring your father and mother… All of these are sin. All of these are EQUAL in God’s eyes. In our own world, we tend to weigh them according to their damage level, but God sees them through eyes we can’t even fathom.

But when we go to the Bible, we find that God has a different attitude about sin. There are many passages like Isaiah 59 that teach that sin–any sin–separates us from the Lord. From a salvation perspective, no where does the Bible teach that some sins are worse than others. In fact, we find some interesting groupings of sins when we study this topic. For example, Paul wrote in Galations 5:19-21,

“Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleaness, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”

Paul says that just like a murderer won’t get into heaven, neither will someone who tells lies. Neither the adulterer nor the person who can’t control his temper (see “outbursts of wrath” in verse 20) will see Heaven. Revelation 21:8 has a similar list of sins that we might not equate on a mortal level of consequense, but that God does equate.

Please, consider what you may be doing with your mouth that’s harming the body of Christ. One day we will all stand and give an account. Please take my words to heart… Gossip is as destructive as murder, rape or any of the other horrid sins listed above.

1 John 3:15-16
Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer; and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.