Love Has a Name
Learning to Love the Different, the Difficult, and Everyone Else
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5.0 • 3 Ratings
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
Discover the joy of stepping out and intentionally loving the people around you.
“Love has a name, and that name isn’t Mark or Adam or even yours! That name is Jesus, and when we make love about him, everything else falls into place. Struggling to love? Pick up this book!”—Mark Batterson, New York Times bestselling author of The Circle Maker and lead pastor of National Community Church
Who does Jesus love? The stranger who looks strange. The driver who cuts us off in traffic. The person online who thinks differently than we do.
Loving people is hard. Especially when it involves the difficult people in our lives and those different from us. We say we love others, but really we don’t. Instead of loving, we hurt, belittle, and overlook people. Which is precisely why we need to learn how to love—from Jesus and from one another.
Adam Weber knows firsthand how important it is to learn to love. And he’s learned incredible lessons from incredible people—some of them quite unexpected. With hope, humor, stretched comfort zones, biblical truth, and (maybe) a few tears, Love Has a Name looks at the most powerful of these stories, showing us twenty-seven people (and one school) who have taught Adam how to love like Jesus.
One name at a time.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Pastor Weber (Talking With God) delves into how to "love one another" in this sparkling work. Weber builds his message presenting vignettes from the lives of 27 people as modern-day parables, each of which is supplemented by related Bible stories. Each chapter highlights someone who has either loved the author or who Weber has struggled to love, including his friend Brett, who was born with cerebral palsy and with whom Weber found a deep love and friendship; Tony, a member of Weber's church who's also a drag queen; and Bill, a drug dealer, sex offender, and the author's former neighbor. Weber challenges readers to embody Christ-like love by befriending those whose stories differ from their own. Instead of judging or trying to fix others (which the author reminds is Jesus's job, not theirs), Weber promotes seeking common ground, listening to others, and showing respect for differing points of view. Though Weber's prose is conversational, at times it skews too far toward youth pastor such as when he gushes about Justin Bieber ("the Biebs") or borrows his kids' expression "boom roasted." Both Christian adults and teens will find Weber's approach to learning to love practical and personally challenging.
Customer Reviews
FOR SUCH A TIME AS THIS!
“God does not love some ideal person, but rather human beings just as we are.” —Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Author Adam Weber has written a powerful, life-changing book. It is a quick, easy read yet it will challenge readers to rethink the way they approach everyone they know or meet. Weber’s premise is to truly change readers’ way of thinking and teach them to make conscious, willful and verbal decisions to make sure that Love has A Name! I truly believe that Weber’s book will help readers change the lives of all around them if they practice the simple principles that Jesus set forth: Love God. Love Others. This book was definitely written For Such A Time as This when there are far too many people who feel as though they are overlooked by most of society. Weber shows readers by example what a difference can be made in a person’s life when we learn to love them the way Jesus would.
Weber starts his book by sharing this insight. “Jesus shows us that knowing people’s stories is the path to fully loving them. The pathway to love always begins with a story. Not our stories, but their stories. We can’t love people if we can’t truly see them, and we can’t really see and know people without knowing their stories.” How many of us take time to really know the stories of our families, our friends much less strangers we just meet? What a difference it would make if we all took time to learn some one else’s story! This book challenged me because it has made me realize the times I have failed to stop and take time to listen to another person’s story. What is my excuse??If I did, it would surely explain so much about them! It would help us all to understand each other so much more!! Weber uses the example of twenty-seven people and one school that have taught him about what it means for Love to have a Name. Love has a NAME and it is JESUS!! People will only know of our love for God by how they see us love others. We should be loving others EXTRAVAGANTLY!
I was provided a complimentary copy of this book by Waterbrook. The opinions expressed here are completely my own and without influence.