Last night while reading Broken-Down House by Paul D. Tripp I had to admit that I fail miserably at what he as "Cruciform Love" (the love we give other that shapes itself, molds itself to resemble in some essential way what took place at the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ.). It is a willing self-sacrifice for the redemptive good of another. He gives the following practical terms to suggest what it means to be committed to being an instrument of cross-shaped love:

1. Not keeping yourself so busy with you and yours that you have no practical time to love others.
2. Being committed to knowing people, because you can minister only in very limited ways to those whom you do not know.
3. Being willing to have your life complicated by the needs and struggles of others.
4. Being willing to share your physical resources with others.
5. Being willing to live with an open home.
6. Being perseverant and patient even when the love you give is not returned.
7. Actively looking for places where you can function as one of God's tools of love.
8. Resisting the temptation to be judgmental, self-righteous, and critical.
9. Overlooking minor offenses and fighting the temptation to become bitter or cynical.
10. Making life decisions out of a recognition of this inescapable call to love.
11. Being lovingly and humbly honest in moments of misunderstanding; more committed to reconciliation than to being right.
12. Admitting that you are still learning to love as you have been loved.
13. Being willing to own up to your sin and admit your faults.
14. Not judging the success of your life by the size of your house or bank account, or by the quality of your car, but the the quality of your love for God and others.
15. Regularly examining the motivations, desires, and thoughts of your heart in the mirror of God's Word.
16. Moving beyond simply surrounding yourself with people whom you find comfortable and likeable.
17. Being a student of God's Word, a joyful participant in the means of grace, and a committed participant in the fellowship of the body of Christ, so that the love you offer others may be increasingly pure and mature.
18. Being willing to be misunderstood, mistreated, and misrepresented for the sake of incarnating Christ's love.
19. Overcoming evil with good.
20. Not letting race, social class, gender, age, or ethnicity get in the way of a biblical call to Christlike love.
21. Willing to have your schedule and plans interrupted or altered.
22. Willing to grant and seek forgiveness.
23. Paying attention to the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of the people God puts in your path, and looking for ways to help them bear these burdens.
24. Believing that God will not call you to a task without giving you what you need to accomplish it.
25. Willing to get up earlier and stay up later.
26. Learning the details about someone's struggle so that you love wisely, while at the same time guarding the reputation of the person you are loving.
27. Weeping with the one who weeps and rejoicing with the one who rejoices.
28. Willing to endure tense and uncomfortable situations lovingly.
29. Not allowing yourself plausible excuses that seemingly free your from love's call.
30. Making a commitment to being a faithful friend.
31. Willing to take on big things, even as you humbly admit your limits.
32. Keeping your promises and being faithful to your word.
33. Being open to correction, loving criticism, and godly rebuke.
34. Believing in the body of Christ and recognizing that you are but one of the tools in God's big toolbox of redemption.
35. Being open to sound counsel and receptive to advice.
36. Willing to go to bed tired and to awake to another day of calling.
37. Hiding God's Word in your heart and keeping his Kingdom always before your eyes.
38. Refusing to become anyone's substitute messiah, but instead to point people to the presence and grace of Jesus.
39. Looking out not only for your own interests, but also for the interests of others.
40. Building relationships, not just for the purpose of being relationally comfortable, but so that those relationship would be a workroom for redemption.
41. Loving people in such a way that they never feel like thy are in debt to you.
42. Remembering that you are more like than unlike the people you are called to love.
43. Understanding that the call to love is a call to both word and deed.
44. Daily remembering Jesus, being in awe of the gift of his love and living thankfully.