"Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends"

I tried a new little recipe for my bible study treats this week. I made orange/almond whoopie pies. They turned out perfectly and were devoured with great compliments at bible study. I think I might have to give a few more whoopie pie recipes a try in the near future, they're such a great little snack size treat!

Since I've been going to this Bible Study, we've been going through the book of John. Last night we did the second half of chapter 15. One of the verses that really stood out to me was John 15:13 "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends". Since I live in a Navy town, most of the people at the Bible study are connected to the Navy in one way or another. The guy who leads the study made a point that this verse is used a lot in military memorials. I feel like a lot of people that I know or hear about in the Navy have that love mentality based on patriotism, but I wonder how many people would lay down their lives for Jesus. Jesus spoke the words right before he gave the ultimate sacrifice and died on the cross. It really makes me evaluate how severe that love is. Jesus also commanded us in the same passage to love one another as he has loved us. That's a pretty high bar to strive towards and I am quite certain that I fail misserabley quite often.  We also discussed what makes a Christian a Christian. So many people claim to be a Christian because they went to church when they were little or because their parents were.  Just because someone doesn't do drugs or murder people doesn't make them a Christian, and I think society as a whole has been forgetting what it really takes to get into heaven. Just something to think about.