Love? Really?

This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture that reject fear and promote faith. It emphasizes the importance of love, acceptance, and unity among believers. The transcript also suggests that different forms of worship and expressions of faith can coexist within the church. It emphasizes the need to love one another and follow the example of Jesus. The love of Christ should guide our actions and decisions. By living in Him and through His grace, we can love and live righteously. Welcome to Fear No Fear. Grace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. May the Holy Spirit embrace you today. This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture. We reject fear in any and all forms. Fear is a spiritual force, the currency of darkness and ignorance. It's what we inherited when Adam gave up his faith and Satan uses it to keep people down. His only weapon is words. If he can get you believing or looking at words of fear, he's got you. Instead, we champion faith as an allegiance to God, as a belief and trust and loyalty to the Lord God Almighty. We accept the evidence of His word as unvarnished truth, as is, just as it's written. We get close to His perfect love through the word, and perfect love casts out fear. 1 John 4.18 All scripture is taken from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Visit eBible.org 1 Corinthians 16.10 Now if Timothy comes, see that he is with you without fear, for he does the work of the Lord as I also do. What is it about humanity that we constantly need warnings like this? Why is it that still today we worry about how our friends or family will be treated when they go somewhere, or ourselves for that matter? Why is it that what we think about a person dictates how we treat them? This is a huge issue facing the world today. What is it they say? To be against something is to be phobic about it? Well, that can be true. It certainly shouldn't be the norm. Whether we agree with someone's lifestyle, politics, religion, or fashion sense, we could still accept the person as someone worthy of being loved, of being accepted. You don't have to permit or put up with immoral behavior and still want the best for someone. God is love, and we are commanded to love. I am capable of saying that God's morality says X is wrong without being prejudiced, biased, or against the person doing X. That person has worth, and I will respect them because of it. They have a 100% right to choose to live as God says we should or to not. I had and have the same choice. How can I hold them to a different standard than myself? Part of what God says to do, part of that morality, is to love as a choice. Jesus said it during the Last Supper, the very last time that he had to teach anything to his disciples. And he mentions it twice, once in John 13, 34-35, and again in John 15, 12, and 17. Jesus said it when he had limited time. Jesus said it twice. That makes it kind of important, doesn't it? And he doesn't say it as a standalone. He doesn't say it off the cuff. He says it as part of a larger web of teaching that he's already given on the subject. Jesus said it was the greatest commandment in Matthew 22, 36. Paul taught on it further in Romans 13, 8-10. For the commandments, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, you shall not covet, and whatever other commandments there are, are all summed up in this saying. Namely, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love doesn't harm a neighbor. Love, therefore, is the fulfillment of the law. This is a moral conduct issue, then. This is witnessing, then, because the world doesn't do this at all. They have moments of kindness, but they are selfish. They have moments of love, but they walk in grudge more than forgiveness. They have moments of goodness, but at their core they are not. No one, no one outside of Christ can manage an entire worldview based on unselfish, holy, unconditional love. He is the only one with a righteous nature. If we are not inhabiting Jesus' nature, we're going to fall back on the patterns of the flesh. If we subject ourselves to Christ Jesus, we gain, through grace, His Spirit, through whom we have access to all the fruits of the Spirit. We have the ability to choose love without agenda. It doesn't happen automatically. We must choose, declare, and walk in the fruit of the Spirit with intent. We must cultivate and tend our spiritual tree. We are commanded to love one another, the world, yes, but also each other within the Church itself, something so obvious and basic that most of us miss it completely. 1 Thessalonians 4.9 says, But concerning brotherly love, you have no need that one write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another. Brothers and sisters in the Lord should love each other, accept, support, encourage, and lift each other up. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of all that I said to you. John 14.26 Holy Spirit will teach us, guide us, inform us in our spirits on what is the acceptable way of communicating. I cannot tell you how often I am saying something to my kids and a prickling kicks up in my spirit, either a change the words or a good words prickle. We need to be open with each other, yes, but we need to be motivated by nurturing love. What else does family do? We rise above differences of opinion. We form a unit of diversity devoted and set apart from the rest of the world, a cocoon of kindness toward one another with a bond no one else shares. As believers, we are all in the body of Christ. We are the bride of Christ. We are one unit of family. We can rise above our differences of opinion. We can rise above minor theological arguments, even if we make them major. What if all the different theological points that came to cement denomination were really further revelation and operational options we had within a single church entity? I mean, if the offices of the church were given with variety, Ephesians 4.11 tells us, he gave some to be apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some shepherds and teachers. Well, then doesn't it make sense that there is also a variety of operation within the body? Perhaps some were meant to walk in faith healing while others were meant to walk in liturgical ceremony and others in riverside baptisms and others in holy ghost singing and shouting extravaganza so that the wide variety of human personality, temperament, and personal comfort level could find a home within the church? Find something that speaks to them where they are at, whatever stage of development and spiritual walk they were on? Sanctification is a journey, after all. We are never in the same place all the time. We move and walk and journey at all different levels along the experience of life. Doesn't it make sense that the church was to be a single unit, a single entity, but with many different offices of participation to address that constant flux of the human spirit as we are transformed from who we were to who we are in Christ Jesus our Lord? Now, you may not believe that or think that, and that's okay. It's a thought for consideration, not doctrine to ram down anyone's throat. Now, what is something for us all to do? What is something that is a command? It's for us to stick together and be together united in Christ. In Matthew 18, 20, Jesus says, for where two or three are gathered in my name, I am in the middle of them. I don't think he meant to hold us apart while we attempt to punch each other's faces. Agreement is a key component to standing together and asking the Father. As the same body, the same family of believers, we can put aside our differences and respect each other enough to get along and fellowship. I know, I know, the humanity in us is groaning at the effort that seems to entail. Is there a way to do it? Yes! Being in Jesus will accomplish it if we let him accomplish it in us. 1 Peter 1, 22-23 says, Seeing you have purified your souls in your obedience to the truth through the Spirit in sincere brotherly affection, love one another from the heart fervently, having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and remains forever. Being obedient to God and loving is easy when we are in Christ Jesus. We are new creatures, not an identity of sinners saved by grace, which clings to the unworthy sinner part of salvation. An identity of redeemed and made new by grace, which clings to the sin is gone forever through Jesus part of salvation. We have new lives, new spirits, new personalities. Loving one another is a key aspect of the kingdom. It has been from the beginning, 1 John 3, 11-17. It is also a proof of our salvation, 1 John 3, 23-25. When we make it part of our spirit, by simply accepting and applying the truth Jesus has for us, we can conquer our love of jealousy and strife, replacing it with a love for our fellow brothers and sisters, Philippians 2-3. When we let Jesus renew our spirits, when we strive to develop a fellowship with Jesus through the word and through prayer, we prosper in all things, 3 John 2, which includes healing of our hearts, emotions, and bodies, new creatures. When we seek the Lord honestly and in love, we lack no good thing, Psalm 34, 10. When we love one another honestly and by conscious choice, we will therefore have good fellowship. Love one another. It's a lifestyle, it's a blessing, and it's a command. Our daily affirmation of God's love is 2 Corinthians 5, 14-15. As a believer, should anything hold you back? Yes, and yes again. The love of Christ. Jesus died for us. Every one of us. He died for you. Paid the price for your sins. For all sin. Enabled you to choose to have eternal fellowship with His Father in heaven. He died for you, and you died in Him. You rose again to life with Him, and now you were a new creature. Hallelujah for that. The love of Christ should be your watchword. The thing you aspire to and that you judge everything by. Because you're living in Him, you should do nothing that He didn't or wouldn't do. Jesus is a righteous judge. Revelation 19-11. We're saved by grace, but Jesus is still the judge. If Jesus would not condemn, we should not. If Jesus would love, we should love. Period. By grace through faith in Jesus, we can do it. Live righteously in Him as He called us to. He gives us His Spirit so that we can, through Him, achieve righteousness. Not on our own. On our own, we can do nothing. But the merciful God helps us. Be helped today. Rely on Holy Spirit to keep your paths straight. Proverbs 3, 6-7. Accept His love. Walk in His love. He is love. As we close, remember that you have worth. You are precious and valuable. Declare this. Today, God loves that I, now you, fill in the blank. Was it a meal you made? A smile you gave? Did you get out of bed? Read? Put on socks? There's no wrong answers here. There is no end to God's love. And no end to the things about you that He loves each and every day. Pick one. And remember, the Lord loves you. Just because you're you. 1 John 4, 9-10 tells us. By this, God's love was revealed in us. That God has sent His only born Son into the world. That we might live through Him. And this is love. Not that we love God. But that He loved us. And sent His Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. His perfect love turned away God's wrath because of sin. And it casts out our fear too. See verses 18 and 19. We love because He first loved us. He just loves us. Can't get enough of us. And that is wonderful. See you next time.