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Community Together · Life For Toledo

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  We forget sometimes that we live in community.
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  People live in a city because they're supposed to take care of their neighbors and so on.
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  We live near water because we all need the water.
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  We need safety.
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  We need protection from one another, by one another, for one another and so on.
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  In Deuteronomy 23, 25, it says,
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  when you enter your neighbor's standing grain,
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  then you may pluck the heads with your hands,
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  or you shall not wield a sickle in your neighbor's standing grain.
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  Basically, what they're saying was,
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  it's okay for us to profit off of one another.
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  It's okay for us to be generous toward one another.
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  It's okay for others to consume some of our resources.
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  But the bottom line is,
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  they should come intentionally with a sickle to carve deep into our sustenance.
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  Using a sickle is a more purposeful taking of that which doesn't belong to you.
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  Basically, the difference between taking something along the way,
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  like Providence, etc.,
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  is different than purposefully taking that which does not belong to you.
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  So if you have somebody who comes to your house,
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  it's okay to be generous toward them, practice hospitality or so on.
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  If you have somebody who comes into your life,
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  it's okay to give them minorly here or there or whatever,
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  whatever you can help them with.
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  That's as if they were picking the grain a little bit with their hand.
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  But if they come intentionally trying to take from you,
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  intentionally taking more than what's reasonable,
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  then that's where you have to say,
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  no, that's not acceptable.
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  This is the sustenance with which God has given me,
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  and I will bless others with it,
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  but I'm not going to allow you to take it from me or to misuse me.
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  God wants us to be wise in all things,
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  and we can prosper along the way, and that's fine.
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  But misusing others or being misused by others is not acceptable.
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  God bless you today. Stand firm.