Jesus said, �This is how the world is going to know that you belong to Me. It�s how you love each other.� I just love that verse from the Bible. That�s John 13.35. I love that God says, �How you love each other is what shows to the world that you belong to Me.� It�s not necessarily how much you love God, how much you read your Bible.
I mean, that�s all part of it, absolutely. But what shows the world that we belong to Jesus, how we love each other. That�s Becky Kapitzke, and she�s with us today on Focus on the Family. We�re so glad you joined us.
Your host is Focus President and author Jim Daly, and I�m John Fuller. John, I love hearing stories about how God uses people to bless others. I try to look for that opportunity. I don�t think I do it as often as I should.
A blessing can be simple and sweet, like paying for the person behind you in the drive-through. I have done that a couple of times. I�ve been with you when you�ve done it. It�s pretty fun.
It is fun. People�s faces are like, �What?� Or it can be a life-changing event, like adopting a child out of foster care. I mean, that is a big commitment, and people do it, and God bless them for doing it. Here at Focus on the Family, we want to help your relationship with the Lord be vibrant and thriving, to provide you with the tools you need to get the most out of your Christian life. I mean, that�s a good goal, and it�s wonderful to receive blessings, but when you bless others, you are aligning with what Jesus identified as the greatest commandment in the New Testament book of Matthew chapter 22, verses 37 through 39.
It says this, �You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.� Then it goes on to say, �This is the great and first commandment, and a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.� The first one, I feel like we all can do pretty quickly. Yeah, Lord, I love you. Second one, I don�t love my neighbor that much, right? Not that neighbor.
Yeah. So today, we want to remind you that true blessings and joy come from considering others more important than yourself, and offer some really practical suggestions on how you can show love to your neighbor. As I mentioned, Becky Kapitzke is with us again. She�s a mom to Clara and Noel, and coaches Christian writers, speakers, podcasters, and other creators.
She�s an author, and her latest book is titled Love Because, How to Change the World One Blessing at a Time. Becky, welcome back. Thank you for having me.
It�s so fun to be here. Yeah. What a great topic, though. You picked a great topic to write on. And it�s one that�s very close to my heart, the idea of� Why is that? Why did this kind of capture you?
Well, I�ll tell you. It started with a conversation I had with a dear friend of mine. Her name is Erin, and she lost her husband and her daughter tragically to a shooting that happened in our community, and there was nationwide media buzz around it.
But what people don�t see is the aftermath of that, how people continue to live on. And so several months after the incident, I was at Erin�s house helping her to clean out some closets, and we were having a conversation about her husband, John. And she was telling me how the last year of their marriage, they didn�t know it was going to be the last year of their marriage, but they had been very intentional about blessing one another, about finding ways to show love in action to each other.
And in doing so, their relationship grew because they were thinking less of self and more of the other. And she used this term. She said it was like we couldn�t wait to out bless each other. And that just struck me.
In my seat, I sat there. We were eating lunch, and I looked at her and I said, �Out bless.� That is an amazing concept. And from there, God would not let it go. I kept formulating this thought. What would the world look like? What would my family look like if I intentionally went out of myself to bless them, even when I didn�t feel like it, even when I thought maybe they don�t deserve it? But what would it look like? And then if they were to reciprocate, what would that do to change a family?
And beyond that, what could that do to change a community? And so that�s where the idea for this book was born. And I was so blessed to get to spend months examining through scripture and through stories from other people the real power that we hold in sharing God�s love with other people through simple blessings, which are just love in action, looking outside of yourself. Let me ask you, your mentor Cindy has set a great example for you. How did she try to be a blessing to her son-in-law? I think that�s a story right out of the book.
Yes. Oh, I love Cindy. She has taught me well for many, many years.
And her children are now married and she has grandchildren. And she�s been able to speak into my life in so many beautiful ways. And just one of her many nuggets of wisdom was to be a blessing. And that is the � I call it a mantra or a model that she uses in her relationship with her son-in-law and now her daughters-in-law. To be a blessing, which means support them, support her and specifically her son-in-law, support his role as head of his new household. And to not be the reason that there is discord in their marriage. Wow, that�s good.
That�s good, right? And what�s so funny is I�m thinking, how many mothers-in-law actually have that sort of focus in mind? But I believe that is why Cindy has made it so intentional. Because it doesn�t come naturally. It doesn�t come naturally to want to be a blessing to the other people in your life.
To choose not to step in perhaps when you want to in order to enable someone else�s relationship to solidify. So I really appreciate that about her. Well, that�s one of those great examples where the world will joke about the in-law.
How many mother-in-law jokes exist, right? And so you almost step into that relationship with a predisposition toward antagonism. Yes. Rather than, okay, I�m going to make this positive.
Yes. And that�s so critical. Why can�t it be that way? I already pray in advance for my daughter�s someday husbands, for the parents who are raising those someday husbands. And I already pray, Lord, let me be a blessing in those relationships.
Now, we don�t know. My oldest daughter now is 14. I don�t� not yet, but someday.
My oldest son�s 21. It�s not yet. What are you talking about? I don�t know when the day comes, but they�re going to bring somebody home who�s going to end up being a part of our family permanently.
And I want to be a blessing to that person. And that was tongue in cheek. Trent, go find a nice wife. All right. But not yet. Yeah, right. Now�s good. Start courting. You know, I said in the open, blessings can be small and seemingly insignificant.
I would think that accumulation is really important. But you describe a time when your husband�s travel mug, and I love this one because I did this this morning with Jean. You did? She, you know, we try to preset the coffee. So when we get up, we just hit a button. It�s always nice when that happens.
And Jean did that last night. And so I was able to get up and she had my cup sitting there, but her cup wasn�t there because her cup was in the clean dishwasher. So I, okay, I�m going to get her cup out since she got my cup out and set her up for her little coffee treat after she gets up. I got up first.
But that�s kind of what you�re talking about. What did you do for your husband? Well, I�ll tell you what. I walked into the house. It was, I had just done school drop off. I worked from home.
I had a ton of deadlines at my desk. Normally, my plan is to just blaze through the kitchen, go to my office, get some work done. But I turned and I looked at the sink and Chad�s favorite travel mug was sitting there. Normally, I would think it�s his thing. I don�t even drink the coffee in the household. So I�ll let him wash it. Let him take care of all of the various coffee mugs that he collects in his car at the house. That�s dirty coffee.
I know, right? And, but then I thought, wait a second. I�m standing right here at the sink. I am looking at this mug. What would it hurt to wash it for him? But more importantly, what would it say if I did wash it for him?
It�s not an idea of, well, I guess it wouldn�t hurt if I did this for him, but what effect would it have if I did? And it was simply a coffee mug. And I decided to take three minutes out of my day.
It�s not a grand gesture. It was three minutes standing at the sink. I scrubbed that mug because I knew it was a wash. That�s a good wash. Three minutes.
A lot longer than I spent. You should have seen the coffee mug. No, and that�s a great example. Right. Because what does that say? It�s not a coffee mug at that moment. It is saying, this is someone who God gave to me.
I love dearly. And if all it takes to show him, to remind him that I was thinking about him, I was thinking about what matters to him is to wash a little mug, then why wouldn�t I do it? Yeah. Becky, I�ll answer that question because here�s the thing. I think it comes down to temperament and I�m not going to stereotype whether this is a wife thing or a husband because I know in today�s modern culture, hopefully we�re all chipping in and doing different things and getting that done. But I think a highly rules-oriented person can talk themselves out of that because you know what?
I�m kind of training them. It might be the husband. It might be the kids, but you know, I�m training them to pick up after their messes.
So for me to wash his cup, I would be enabling his bad behavior. I�m just saying. That�s a really logical reason. It�s a very logical reason. It�s a very informed question, isn�t it?
But it�s true and this is what we battle in our minds, right? Well, I need to teach them that they need to pick up after themselves. My daughter was at Bible camp and in my mind, she needs to figure out how to clean her own room. I�m going to touch that room. But what would it say to her if she came back from camp and I had put the brand new sheets on her bed?
I had made things tidy. What does that say to her? Yeah, I love you. Exactly. And isn�t an I love you just as or perhaps more important than a moment of training in how we live according to our rules and regulations?
Love trumps everything. Yeah. And I think you would agree that it�s all about the balance of doing that.
You know, you can also be a person that derives a lot of self-benefit from doing those acts. Right. Because it�s making you feel good that I�m good. Right.
It�s making you feel good that I�m so good. That�s the martyr. That�s the martyr mom who says, �Well, I just cleaned the entire house for you people.� Aren�t I a good person? I�m a very good person. You are a good person. That�s wonderful.
But if you�re in that spot, you probably aren�t getting credit for that. No, but I�ll tell you what happens when we do these small acts of kindness, of love, these small gestures. They actually help us stop thinking about the things that annoy us. I could look at my husband�s shoes sitting in the hallway, although more often I will tell you it�s my shoes sitting in the hallway.
But let�s just use this as an example. And I don�t want to trip over those shoes. And I can run all sorts of thoughts in my head that say, �Oh, he left his shoes out again. And why isn�t he thinking about me? And why is he being so annoying?� Instead, how about if I took those shoes and I put them away for him? And then I no longer have anything to complain about.
And I�ve just done him a blessing. How countercultural is that, though? Yeah. Are you just going to insert guys that have the shoes down? Think of your laundry. Why we leave it four feet from the laundry bin. I�m terrible at that. You got a friend that does that.
I�m either a very bad basketball player or, you know, I just leave it there and assume somebody�s going to pick it up and put it in there. Well, my husband is more likely the person to do our laundry. So I appreciate that about him. In which case� Oh, stab me in the heart.
But what do I do? I complain that he shrunk something. Come on, really? Because he was being kind. He was going out of his way to think about us. So how we receive another person�s blessing is also a big part of giving love generously. And it�s okay.
I mean, if you hadn�t written about it, would Chad have known that you washed his travel mug, going back to that story? I don�t know. Is that all right? It is all right, because why? Why are we doing it? It�s for the other person.
It�s to show love and build that relationship, yes. But ultimately, it is an act of obedience to the Lord, because the Lord has given us our relationships. The Lord tells us, Jesus said, �This is how the world is going to know that you belong to me. It�s how you love each other.� I just love that verse from the Bible.
That�s John 1335. I love that God says, �How you love each other is what shows to the world that you belong to me.� It�s not necessarily how much you love God, how much you read your Bible. I mean, that�s all part of it, absolutely. But what shows the world that we belong to Jesus? How we love each other. Becky, you lay out the blessing toolbox.
I like the imagery of that. I�m just wondering what�s in the box. What are some principles, I guess those would be principles, we need to keep in mind as we set out to bless those around us. What�s in the toolbox? Well, if you think about it, if you�re going to build something, you need tools, right? So we�re trying to build these relationships. I don�t.
We�re defined by that. I can�t build anything. You can�t hire people with tools.
I can�t build anything. Well, what do they have in their toolbox? Yeah, okay.
I look at their toolbox, but wow, I wish I knew how to use that. So anyway, back to the hammer and the saw. Right. So I identify eight core principles that we need to have in our toolbox in order to really bless people well.
And the first one, the top one is to remain in that vine. You�ve got to remain close to God because we can�t pour out what hasn�t first been poured into us. So when we remain close to the Lord and we�ve got His love in our hearts and we are remembering what He wants from us, it�s so much more natural for that to pour out.
Right. So start with your Jerusalem. There is a story in the book of Acts where Jesus has just given a great commission to His disciples and He�s telling them now go out and be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. Start with your Jerusalem and that�s your home. It�s your home. The whole idea of wanting to go out and bless all the world and work for Jesus and touch strangers� lives is beautiful. But if you�re doing that at the expense of your central family, that�s not how God designed it.
Before you move through the other tools, let me ask you right there. And we�ve experienced this to be fair. Jean�s got a tremendous heart to help people. I can remember a couple years ago, I mean, she just had a lot of friends that were having surgery or something was going wrong. And I think one week, I mean, she provided five meals for others and that meant cooking, starting about three and then driving it over and getting home about six, thirty or seven because, you know, she caught the mom on the porch and they started talking. And I�m going, �Well, I guess it�s hot dog, boys.� Of course, the boys are going, �Hot dogs again? Dad?� Not that I can�t cook dinner. I don�t want to give that impression. But Jean normally cooks dinner.
I do breakfast on the weekend. But speak to that conflict. Again, it�s back to balance. It is. I mean, you can have a lot of things go down with your friends all at once and then you�re pulled on. And so your family�s not first. It�s true. And I think husband�s too, I think, I�m sorry, it�s not that I�ve lived this or any personal session, but I think with husband�s too, we�ve got to put our own selfishness down a bit, right, and realize that our wife is blessing somebody and we need to support her in that.
And I think it goes both ways, husband�s, wives. We�ve got to have open communication about the needs that are happening on any particular day, any particular week. And Chad and I call this checking in with each other. So in the morning or the night before, what do you have going tomorrow? Four meals.
Hot dogs. That�s what I�ve got going. And so we just need to make sure we�re, first of all, communicating.
Well, my friend has this need and so I really want to be able to meet with her. Can we work with that? Sometimes it means I may not be home until such hour.
Are you okay with that? So just open communication, I think, can help. But then just keeping your priorities straight and identifying when all of the serving elsewhere, it�s not necessarily even friends in need, but maybe the ministry that you�re doing at church, the volunteer work that we�re doing for local community agencies. At what point is the family sacrificing you and all of your doing good things for other people, which means at that point, is it time to scale it back and recognize it�s time to focus on that family first?
I like that word, by the way. Nice phrase. Focus on the family first, put that in there. So moving through that, Jerusalem, take care of your family, make sure you�re blessing them as well.
What�s next? Absolutely. Well, first of all, no blessing is too small. So again, you don�t need to go on some tropical vacation, you don�t need diamond earrings. It�s the little things that really add up and that�s what defines a relationship long term.
And then be a cheerleader. Words are so important. Words are so important. So encouragement goes a long way, how we�re using our words, how we�re using our tone of voice.
And then play the right tapes. I mentioned earlier, if I�m going to sit and stew over my loved one�s annoying habits, those annoying habits are going to be a lot more prevalent in my life. But instead, can I stop and think about all the things that I love about that person, all the things that he or she does well?
So what are we allowing to stew in our minds? And then forgive quickly. Please forgive quickly. That is such an important principle for Christians in general. Because forgiveness leads to compassion. My pastor says, keep short accounts.
That�s how he says it, keep short accounts. And then show the real you. I almost posted something on Instagram recently that was just my family in a difficult moment.
But because why? We don�t need to see people�s flashy, fancy, perfect lives. A true ministry is filled with honesty in which people can relate to how you are also struggling with something. There was one Christmas when I was looking at everybody else�s beautiful family photos in front of the Christmas tree and everybody was smiling. And so I posted my post-Christmas gift opening shrapnel living room. Yes, this is my life on Christmas.
Can anybody relate? And so many people came in and said, yes, that�s my house too. So just being real and genuine, I think really helps to bless people, to help them feel like they are not alone. And then finally, and this one I will stand on because I did it the wrong way for a long time, is to take care of yourself first. I don�t mean first as in you are more important, but self-care is what enables us to pour into other people. You lay out the four Ps of blessing.
What are those? I mean, we are into the practical nature of what you are talking about here. So I think of these as four categories of ways that we can bless people. Bless with your presence. Be available to people even if you are not physically present. Phone calls, Zoom calls, sending a gift, that is blessing with your presence. Blessing with your possessions. It doesn�t necessarily mean writing a check.
I mean this kindly, but sometimes writing a check is the easy way out. Are you willing to give of yourself, to give of your time and your goods to really serve another person? And it is as simple as my friend Alicia gave a cup of coffee to a homeless man, had a wonderful conversation with him and discovered he was listening to worship music. And she felt so cut to the quick from that. She thought she was serving him, but in the end he served her with a wonderful lesson. So our presence, our possessions, our perspective, are we looking at other people the way God looks at them?
Or are we judging based on appearances? And that is so hard. It is very hard. And so you can bless people simply by having the right perspective of them as being someone that God created and someone God loves. And then prayer is such a huge way to bless people. Even when you feel like there is nothing else you can do, prayer should always be first anyway. It is the one blessing that directly invokes the action of God. That's good.
In that possession category, you had a situation where you were blessed. And that sometimes is a little uncomfortable, but it was a big thing, right? It is. Your girls were not happy perhaps with their little piano.
Yes. This was back when my girls were, they were just starting to take piano lessons and they were becoming skilled enough. They needed a really good instrument and they were still working on my 20 year old weighted keyboard that I had gotten for a college graduation gift.
It was not ideal for them to learn acoustic piano. And so I was talking about it back stage, I'm on the worship team at my church, and the bass player happened to overhear me. And he sent an email later in the week and said, I heard you're looking for a piano. I happen to have mine.
My kids are grown, they're gone from the house. I have it right here in my back pocket. I have it right here in my pocket. But he said, we're moving and we don't have a need for the piano. Would you like to have it?
Wow. And it was such a tremendous blessing and now my girls have been playing on that piano for years. And it spoke to a direct need of mine and was given in such a selfless way and he was so humble about it. Other people had offered to sell us their pianos and that would have been wonderful too.
But he just said, you know what? I recognize a need here. I don't need it. God blessed me with it. He blessed us with this excellent new house and we don't have space for the piano.
I want you to have a piano. Yeah. One of the P's you're mentioning is perspective. And it's funny, how can I bless another person with my perspective? I tend to over bless people with my perspective.
You're very enthusiastic and optimistic. It's a good thing. So straighten me out here. What do you mean by blessing with your perspective? Well, primarily what I mean there is seeing people as someone that God created has as much value and is worthy of as much respect as you are, as the people in your circles are. And if that person looks different, if that person speaks different, if that person has differing opinions, that person is still worthy of respect and dignity.
Because like you had said earlier, we're all created in the image of God. And it's funny because my senior pastor was the one who really pointed this out to me and told me a story of how he went to the grocery store. And he's a really straight talking Italian guy.
I love our pastor. And he was in a hurry. And there was a gal in front of him in the checkout line, just taking her time, being chatty with everybody. And she was being very friendly. And he's thinking, come on now.
We've got places to go. And as he said, she was all tatted up and she's got earrings everywhere and not in her ears. And so he formed a judgment. And she turned around and she saw him and he said there was a look on her face and she said, pastor, how fun to see you. I just loved your sermon on Sunday.
And he said he was absolutely crushed and realized this is what we're talking about. We've got to see people the way God sees them, not the way we want to see them with our fast judgments. Because otherwise, as he said, we're out of play. We can't be witnesses in this world if we're judging people on appearances. Assumptions are deadly. Social media is full of assumption.
It's a killer to the human spirit and to community for sure. Let me ask you too, Becky, we kind of touched on this, but that person that perhaps has a small circle of friends or maybe not many at all. And you know, they feel like I don't have that.
I don't have the blessing of blessing others. It reminds me of a conversation I had with a Christian leader one time. And it was funny because we were talking about the fruit of the spirit, you know, love, joy, peace, goodness, all of that and patience. And he actually said, well, I just, you know, I just don't have patience. And I said, I remember just thinking, I said this out loud.
I can't believe I did this. And I said, well, I don't think it's like a menu you ordered from. I mean, if you're a Christian and you're in him, then these things should be present in you.
And if it's not there, that is something to work on. Not to say, oh, you know what? God didn't give me that. He didn't give me mashed potatoes.
I don't feel like eating the broccoli today. So I, it's so true. And patience is one of the fruit that I like to say doesn't grow too hot on my tree, but I know it's still there and we have access to it because believers have fruit of the spirit. I think the same thing of kindness. Kindness is fruit of the spirit.
So Christians have access to it in ways the rest of the world doesn't. There's a difference between being nice and being kind. Kind comes straight from God. And that's so well said. And I think that is the purpose of even having you here today, Becky.
At first I was thinking, this is kind of light. We all know how to bless people, but this has been so informative and so good and challenging. Honestly, we actually really stink at blessing people. I wasn't going to say it that way.
Oh, is it just me? But it's true. It's true.
We're not as well, we can only speak for ourselves. So, you know, I don't think I'm as intentional as I should be at times. And of course we're always going to get busy and there's a hundred reasons why you miss blessing somebody. But like that comment about thinking the best of your spouse, why not think the best of, Lord, let me see where I can bless another person and wake up with that prayer on your lips, right? For the day.
That would be awesome. Well, you've done a wonderful job expressing this, Becky. It's so wonderful to see you again. Your book, Love Because How to Change the World One Blessing at a Time.
And you've just given us so many great little insights. Make sure your family feels blessed. Make sure your friends are blessed. Make sure you're thinking of a variety of ways to do that.
And we've only really scratched the surface of your book. And let me say, a way to bless each other. If you can join us in the ministry here at Focus on the Family, send a gift of any amount and we'll send you Becky's book as our way of saying thank you and blessing you right back.
And it's a wonderful way to bless one another. Get in touch, make a donation as you can and request Becky's book. And you can do that by going online. We'll have all the details there for you in the episode notes. We'll join us again tomorrow. We'll hear a classic presentation from Corrie Ten Boom, who saved 800 Jewish refugees from the Nazis during World War II. She'll share how she was able to extend forgiveness to the man who betrayed her to the Gestapo. And that man wrote to me that you could forgive me is such a great miracle. Your forgiveness has shown me what it means that there is forgiveness through Jesus Christ. I'm Jim Daly and the entire team. Thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family.
I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ. My favorite thing about BRIO is that you can actually absorb stuff from it and learn. Reaching teen girls right where they're at with encouragement to grow in their faith. The stories in the BRIO magazine about other people that have gone through things way worse than I have is really inspiring and uplifting. Help your teen invite God into her everyday experience with BRIO magazine. Learn more at focusonthefamily.com slash BRIO radio.
