Listen to today’s devo!

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives. (1 John 3:16)

Every now and then we hear a heroic story of someone laying down a life so that others can have life. One such story was about Benjamin Clark, a chef who was prepping a meal for the Fiduciary Trust Company on the ninety-sixth floor of the World Trade Center South Tower on September 11, 2001. When the plane hit the building, he didn’t try to escape the disaster himself. Instead, he took the steps to guide others to safety.

Reportedly, Clark ensured that everyone on the ninety-sixth floor evacuated the building immediately. Following the tragic event, a Fiduciary official credited Clark with saving hundreds of lives. It was reported that once they reached the seventy-eighth floor, Clark assisted a woman in a wheelchair. Despite his undeniable heroism, he didn’t survive the tragic event.

True love does not ask, “What can I get out of this relationship?” True love asks, “What can I sacrifice for this relationship?” Jesus Christ was the ultimate example of sacrificial love. Jesus willfully gave his life so that we could have eternal life. The author of 1 John encouraged believers to love one another with the same type of sacrificial love that Jesus modeled for us. Instead of using people or other believers for our own benefit, we should be offering our sacrificial love to one another.

Sacrificial love puts others first.

Ed Love has been in active ministry for seventeen years. He currently serves as the church multiplication director for The Wesleyan Church.

© 2020 Wesleyan Publishing House.  Reprinted from Light from the Word.  Used by permission.  Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.