God is Love

God doesn't just choose to be good, to avoid evil, to act morally, etc. God is holy. He is transcendent from those things—totally set apart and separate from them. It is not just some moral code or ethical law that we find in His law and commands . . . it is the very nature and character of Him. There is such a powerful realization in the truth those few sentences above contain. If someone simply chooses to be a certain way then there is always the option of them choosing not to be that way any longer. But when someone is that way—inherent in who they are, in their very being—and they are completely cut off from, and separated from, the alternative—then we can know with assurance they will always be that way.

The Apostle John tells us twice in 1 John 4 that God is love. It is part of who He is. It is not simply that God chooses to love, but that He is love, and there is a big difference. So, when we don't love another we are partaking in a something that God can't be a part of. He can't be a participant in, or an advocate of, or lend His hand to it when we don't love. So, while I know that He won't ever leave me, and that I am sealed in adoption as His child by my faith in Jesus, there is a sense that each and every time I don't love I am separating myself from God—or separating Him from what I am doing . . . not to mention I am not honoring Him by my choice to disobey Him, and I am failing to love one whom He loves enough to die for.

When I choose to not love another with a love that is patient, kind, not self seeking, not keeping a record of wrongs, not rejoicing in evil, etc., I am, in a sense, choosing to step outside of Him because, He can't be part of "not love" when He is love. I don't know the full "theological" implications (or explanations) of the concept I am trying to convey, but to me it is pretty clear that, up to the edge of losing my salvation, I am separating myself from God in those times (or at least moving outside of Him in my actions, or causing my actions to be outside of His cover and blessing and presence). I don't know if this is what the Bible talks about in quenching the Spirit and grieving the Spirit and things like that, but I do know that if I truly desire Him to be my breath and life, and to bear His image, and to have His voice and Spirit lead me, and to have Him work through me, then I must love. When I don't, in some way He pulls back, because He can't be a part of that because it is against who He is.

Matt 22:37-40   And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.  39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets."

1 John 4:7-8   Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

1 John 4:16   So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

I Gots to Know!

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Today's Post: Over the recent months God has been impressing more and more on me the core essential nature of two commands which Jesus emphasized and left us with found in Mark 12:30–31 and other places. These are, from Mark, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

According to Jesus, all other commandments, and in fact the whole law, hang on these. In fact, it is safe to say from the Bible, that love should be the very fragrance of the Christian—the defining mark by which the world will judge both our Christianity, and even Jesus Himself.

So, I have shared with our fellowship that we will be beginning a period of looking at these two commandments, starting with loving the Lord, our God, with all of our heart and soul and mind and strength, and at some point moving in to loving our neighbor as ourself—loving others as Christ loved us. While there is nothing I will be able to teach that will “make”anyone love God with their all (that is a transaction each person must choose to make with God), we can look at what God means by that, what it should look like, and what our role in it is.

In our society, love has been reduced to a feeling that comes and goes, and a word we all use way to casually and easily, when, in reality, I believe that love is probably more costly, and more of a choice, than many of us, including myself, realize—both in our love for God and our love for others. I have asked our fellowship to meditate on this first commandment. I really look forward to hearing what God shares with us on what He means by loving Him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

So, as the bank robber said to Dirty Harry when Clint Eastwood made his famous, “So, do you feel lucky, punk?” line, “I gots to know!”—I “gots” to know what YOU think God means by loving Him with all of our heart, soul, mind/understanding, and strength. What is He asking? What does it really look like? Does He really mean ALL, and if so how can that be? What is our role in it? What might our life look like if we really did that? Your prayerful comments on this will, I believe, bless both me and others. Please consider meditating on this most important commandment (it is a command, by the way) of all, and don't shy away from the depth of choice and cost you may come to realize it means.

Note: In keeping in the vein of the Clint Eastwood theme of this post, what follows is a fun piece of useless trivia about me for any of you interested in not just my thoughts and reflections, but also in me as a person (ignore it if not—no hard feelings).

When I was at West Point in the mid-80s I was a huge Clint Eastwood fan (especially of his westerns). My roommate, from Puerto Rico, was as well, and to hear him recite lines from Eastwood’s movies in a Puerto Rican, twirled r accent, was really quite fun! (The picture is of him and me in front of the Clint Eastwood poster on the back of our room’s door.) We memorized many of Eastwood's classic lines (“When you have to shoot, shoot, don’t talk,” plus, “I know what you're thinking. Did he fire six shots or only five? Well, to tell you the truth...,” and, “Dyin' ain't much of a living, boy,” plus more). When Clint was elected mayor of my hometown of Carmel, California, it warranted a special late night phone call from my folks with the election news, and when I made the varsity pistol team my dad had a friend of his who was also a friend of Clint’s get me an autographed still from the movie The Outlaw Josey Wales, with a note written on it from Clint Eastwood congratulating me. Now, all of that is probably way more than most of you would ever want to know, but a few of you may enjoy it. God bless (and, no, I don’t still memorize his lines—now I memorize God’s lines—smile).