Here are four practical suggestions:

• pray for the people you live by and work with
• connect with them over real life (a meal, a game, an activity, working out, kids sports leagues, school etc.)
• invite them to serve with you both locally and globally
• learn and live the ways of Jesus together as you connect and serve

You can do these right here and right now. Will you? May I suggest two reasons why. First, because you were made for this. You were made to live beyond self. God desires for you to know Him personally and experience His love, and He desires for you to make His love known to the people you walk with and encounter everyday. Jesus said that He came to give abundant life. He also said that this is how we find life in Him - when we come to the end of self and begin to give our life away.

Second reason is because this is a matter of life and death. This is not just about religious preference. Jesus said He came to give life, but that the "thief" (the evil one) is trying to steal that life from as many as He can. God, in His love, will not force us into relationship with Him. If He did, the relationship wouldn't mean much forced would it? So, God in His grace is giving us time to experience His creation and know His love as we relate to one another. Some choose self, and evil wreaks its havoc. Some choose to live beyond self, and love blossoms. So does life. So does God's Kingdom, on earth as it is in heaven. That's why this is a matter of life and death. We better get to it.

Please commit to cultivating God's love and the signs of His Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven by living beyond self and living sent as a letter of His love and hope into the lives of the people you live by and work with.

Let's be living sent together. It's what we were made for.