Tough Love

In my last post I talked about showing God's love.  We must do this, but God's love is not all rosy and nice.  Some of it is pretty tough and even feels offensive.  As believers we need to use the guidance of the Holy Spirit to know when someone is ready to receive the tough love.

The Bible feels offensive because it is Jesus reading us.  Even as we are reading it, He is right there pointing things out to us.  We are only offended when it points out a thing we know is true, but we do not want it to be true.  We want to have things our way.  Peter felt both the blessed love and the tough love, so let's take a look of how Jesus dealt with this boldest of disciples.

Let's look at how Peter gets it right first.  Matt 16:13-20, "When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, "Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?"  So they said, "Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."  He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?"  Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."

 Jesus answered and said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.  And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.  And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."  Then He commanded His disciples that they should tell no one that He was Jesus the Christ.  (NKJV)

Jesus was reading his disciples when asking them this, just like He reads us through His word.  Peter, the one who is always boldly speaking out, gets it right.  Jesus rewards him by saying he is blessed because he listened to what the Holy Spirit told him rather than his flesh and blood.  Peter is even told he is the rock that the church will be built on.  That what he binds on earth is bound in heaven and what he set loose will be loosed in heaven.  Talk about a great pat on the back showing you got it right.

But the next verses show where Peter turns around and gets it wrong.  Just like him we do the same thing and Peter had Him right there even in flesh and blood.  We still have Him here in the Spirit, so we cannot use the excuse that Peter had an advantage.  We just get in the rut of thinking He cannot be right there because we do not see Him or feel Him.  Love goes far beyond that because it is not based simply on feelings no matter what the world wants to think.

So what did Peter boldly do that was wrong?  Matt 16:21-23, From that time Jesus began to show to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised the third day.  Then Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, "Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You!"  But He turned and said to Peter, "Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men."  (NKJV)

This time Peter is thinking that his life would not be the same if Jesus actually died.  He could not see what the spiritual side of things were because what would he do if Jesus was dead?  What would happen if they did not have their leader and teacher?  Jesus calls him Satan and rebukes him.  Ouch!  Even later Peter says he will never deny Jesus and even as Jesus is being beaten he catches Peter's eye after Peter denied him three times.  With that Peter realized how badly he had messed up and repented of what he did with tears.  Peter learned each time because he was willing to let Jesus read him.

In the world we are to show God's love, including the tough love.  However, we must always speak the truth as the Holy Spirit directs us.  If we do that, then even the tough love will strike home.  Sure people will walk off offended, but if you say what the Spirit told you to, which will line up with God's Word, then the seed will be planted.  We should not be scared that people will be offended even if we tell them the truth in a loving way.  Maybe they will miss the truth if you do not speak up when prompted by the Holy Spirit.

So are we Christians letting Jesus read us as we read His Word so that we can mature?  Sure Jesus will even make us offended if we want to stay in the flesh.  How much so a worldly person we are led to tell the truth to?  It is not an easy road, but if people know we care about them, they will listen.  Do not stop loving people and spreading the truth the way Jesus wants us to.

Show God's Love

The world needs to see the truth of who God really is and why He sent His one and only Son, Jesus, to die for us.  If we are not showing the love that God did in sending Jesus and that which Jesus showed to the masses during his ministry, then we are doing it wrong.  People will see it immediately even if they never heard of Jesus before in their lives.  Our choice of actions will always speak louder than anything else and show the truth of who we really are.

Sure there is plenty of sin and lifestyles out there that do not fall in line with God's will for the world, but we are not to make them feel condemned for it.  All of us are sinners and no sin is greater or smaller than another.  Sin is sin.  However, what we Christians need to remember is how we were adopted into God's family by accepting Jesus as we were at the time.  Romans 8:1-2 states, "Therefore, there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death." (NIV)  If He does not condemn us upon accepting Him, how are others going to even learn this truth if you first condemn them for their sins?

Sure God is going to judge sin for everyone in the end, but we are not to be judge and jury here on earth.  Most people are not going to see you as a loving person if you go for the sin first.  Each of us must reconcile ourselves to God through Jesus by our own choice.  Then if we pursue the relationship with Jesus the truth about sin will be revealed to us.  Each of us will understand this and grow in it at different rates.  So we should not even be condemning other Christians just because they have not learned to see things the way we have learned to through Christ.

I find it sad that churches actually send people out to disrupt funerals of service people just because of some disagreement with the war the US got into that caused the death.  Would you want someone yelling about things they don't like outside the funeral of one of your family members?  I know I would want to slap a few people upside the head if I saw them doing it.  That reaction I would like to do is not the one I would do because slapping them would just make it worse and definitely does not show love.  But this is what I thought when I read about this happening to a friend of mine last fall.  A really close friend of his died fighting in Afghanistan and a local church came out spewing hate against what the war stood for during the funeral.  No wonder my friend still does not like and trust Christians.

The people that made me know they were real Christians were the ones who treated me like a friend even when I did not believe and even admitted to dabbling in occult and magic.  It felt more like them getting to know me first.  My talking of my beliefs opened up the path for them to tell me about theirs.  These few friends were the ones I sought out immediately upon returning home after the weekend at mom's where I did accept Christ.  I knew this was a real thing and I knew I needed real Christians around me to help me understand it.  Sure I knew at least forty other so called Christians, but it was these few ladies that I met before accepting Christ that made me want to have what they had.  I had to get plugged into their church.  I still remember how happy they were when, after knowing me a little over two years, that I told them I accepted Christ and needed to go to their church.

I thank God every day for the true Christians He put in my life.  God knows what He is doing and where He will get us to see His truth and love.  The day the truth lit up my world will always blow away anything I thought was the truth before that.  This past weekend marks my eleventh anniversary as a Christian.  It all started out with Christians who bothered to show me love rather than lambasting me for being mixed up in the occult and other empty beliefs that I knew deep down did not cut it.

God's love is described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  Love never fails." (NIV)

So are you showing the love of God or striking out with condemnation?  Let us think before we act to be sure what we are showing the world coincides with God's Word.