It seems that the hot topic in the
church and in the world today is love. We read in 1 John 4:8 that he who does
not love does not know God because God is love. This has led many to believe
that, through an interpretation of this verse and perhaps other passages[1], that
love (as they conceive of it) is the definition of God. Now I will go on record
and make the theological statement (in agreement especially with John and
Christ himself) that we can know God and know Him truly, though only in part.[2] But I
will also encourage you to examine what you mean (and what John means) when you
say that God is love.
We see God exhibit his love in
manifold ways through the lens of Scripture. The Father loves the Son in a
unique, intra-Trinitarian way. The Son is ultimately lovely and the love
between the Father and Son is, in some systems, personalized into the Holy
Spirit. God also shows his love by disciplining his people and pruning their
sin. He shows his love through common grace, bringing rain down on the just and
the unjust[3]. He
showed his love by the specific act of sending Christ[4]. He
shows a specific love toward his elect that he does not show toward those
outside the fold[5]. I
note these different manifestations of His love to complicate our definition.
Love is not a sentimental, “Do what makes you happy”, emotion. In Luke 13, some
people come to Jesus and tell him a story about Galileans who were murdered by
Pilate during a religious service. Such a story is comparable to you being told
about a number of Christians massacred by government-sanctioned terrorists
during the Eucharist. How does Jesus respond? “Unless you repent, you will all
likewise perish.” Does that sound cold and callous to you? As a good Christian concerned with justice, don't you want to see the wicked punished and the righteous vindicated? That’s because you
haven’t truly grasped Christ’s hatred of sin. You haven’t come into contact
with the agonizing, excruciating pain that He experiences in the Garden of
Gethsemane and on the cross. My challenge to you, as it is to myself, is to pray that God shows you the pain that sin causes and breaks your heart. Christ's commandments are to love God and to love your
neighbor, but without the proper mobilization of the former, the latter is anemic.
Our love has to be properly rooted in Truth, and we all know who the Truth is.
All of this is to encourage us, the
Church, to love God and one another. And one clear manifestation of this is the
church’s acknowledgement of the perniciousness and ubiquity of sin, both within
and outside its “walls”. We must not tolerate it within our walls or within ourselves*. If we truly love our
neighbors in the Church, we must be willing to confront them in their sin, whether it is
adultery, lying or some other offense. At its core, if we are the people of God
and therefore the body of Christ, we cannot allow a wound to fester. We have to
be willing to treat it with salve, which will be initially painful but
ultimately healing, or if the wound does not respond to treatment, the limb
must be amputated.[6] Love
does not delight in unrighteousness but it delights in the Truth. Let us
delight in the Truth so that the world may know that we are His and that the
love that the Father had for the Son in the beginning is now in us.
[1] Lest
I assume a biblical framework that is not holistic.
[2] 1
Corinthians 13:12
[3]
Matthew 5:45
[4] John
3:16
[5]
Exemplified in the privilege of Israel and the statement Paul quotes in Romans
9:13
[6] If
you think this is harsh, read Matthew 18:15-17. Church discipline is a good,
real thing.
*Obviously the Church's authority is not binding for those outside, which Paul speaks on. But if someone is in severe, unrepentant sin and claiming to be a believer, Paul's got some stuff to say about that.
*Obviously the Church's authority is not binding for those outside, which Paul speaks on. But if someone is in severe, unrepentant sin and claiming to be a believer, Paul's got some stuff to say about that.
