|
Oh Lord, Where Do We Go From Here? Current and former members (and anyone in between!)... tell us what is on your mind and in your heart. |
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
06-06-2018, 04:20 PM | #1 |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
All About His LOVE!
It occurred to me almost 20 years ago, that the love of God was the way to understand the Bible. That is, after all is said about what He has done, is doing, and will do, it all comes down to His amazing love for us! He loves us and just wants an ongoing relationship with us.
When I began seeing this, many things in scripture started to open to me like never before and began to make sense. I saw and experienced so much more in a short period of time, than I did in decades before. Why? I saw it was all about His love for us! (Yes He is righteous, but Christ was sent in love to satisfy all that.) A few definitions and observations regarding love: 1. God is love (“God so loved . . .”) 2. Love never fails (all other things fail: knowledge, teachings, etc.) 3. Two greatest NT commandments are exhorting us to love 4. Faith, hope and love remain – but the greatest is LOVE 5. John, the “love apostle” has the final word in NT – epistles talk much about love 6. The church of brotherly love (Philadelphia) receives the specific encouragement 7. Without love – we’re meaningless and empty If you have the right teaching or practice, but it could stumble your brother, we don’t go there – why? Love. The entire law summed up – love God; love others. This new love understanding really helped with the book of Revelation, when we went through it last year. I realized it was actually a book of love! It makes perfect sense to me now, but I think that concept is a little startling at first. Like a cancer in the body, God must deal with the cancerous kingdom on this earth. So he must judge it and take it out. Why? He loves us! So even the book with all the apparently fearful judgments in it are all about His love! This is the proper way to view the Bible. But I used to view it through a lens of fear and potential punishment (“I knew You were a hard man . . .”). |
06-06-2018, 05:48 PM | #2 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
God is also life and light ("I am the way, the truth and the life"), and I think life and light is more important (without life, nothing would exist, and the loving act of sending Jesus to die for us would not mean much without eternal life, and without light, nothing would grow, everything would be in darkness). If we study the bible through the lens of life we cannot go too wrong. Without life, God's love does not make much sense or have much value (God loves us because He gave us life). Some Christians go astray because they get too far into the deep end of love and ignoring life and light - the kind of love without life and light is the New Age or maybe the gay marriage kind of love, or maybe the Mother Teresa "hindus are saved" kind of love.
|
06-06-2018, 07:54 PM | #3 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
I would propose all the attributes (love, light, holiness, righteous, ...) of God are important. When we try to rank one above the other based on our limited personal experience, we can easily get astray. Ecc 7:18 It is better for you to take hold of the one without letting go of the other, for he who fears God will come out of it with them all. |
|
06-06-2018, 07:56 PM | #4 | |
Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν κόσμον For God So Loved The World
Join Date: Apr 2008
Posts: 3,824
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
Shall I continue? Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful. (1 Corinthians 13:4,5) EVERY one of us - Individual Christians and churches and ministries alike, especially any of us who claim to be the standard bearers of the truth and light of God, need to take a long, long look in the mirror to see if our words and actions towards our neighbors and fellow members of the Body of Christ reflect the apostle's admonitions to the Corinthians. He didn't say "Life is patient and kind; Life does not envy or boast, Life does not..." It turns out that Witness Lee, and now, obviously many of his followers, got it backwards, or at the very least, got their priorities mixed up. And it turns out the result is that a movement that claims to be "The Lord's Recovery" has basically turned into a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal. Why? How? By not caring for life? By not meeting as the church in one city? By not striving for the high peak truths? -
__________________
αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων ἀμήν - 1 Peter 5:11 |
|
06-06-2018, 11:04 PM | #5 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
If it is backwards then why did Jesus never say "I came to love" ?. Jesus said that He came to give life (John 10:10). So the point of the cross was so we could have eternal life, not eternal love. That life is more important than love is common sense - when a baby is born into the world, first they get life, then they get love. If a baby cannot breathe, the doctors will try to give the baby life, not love. A sinner, who is dead in their sins, first needs life, before they can receive love.
|
06-06-2018, 11:06 PM | #6 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-07-2018, 07:49 AM | #7 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-07-2018, 08:01 AM | #8 | |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: Greater Ohio
Posts: 13,693
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
Only the followers of Lee support this view. The rest of the body of Christ support Jesus' view (Mark 12.30-31) and Paul's (I Cor 13). In fact, Paul says even if your life ends for noble cause, without love it is all worthless. (v. 3)
__________________
Ohio's motto is: With God all things are possible!. Keeping all my posts short, quick, living, and to the point! |
|
06-07-2018, 10:33 AM | #9 | |
Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν κόσμον For God So Loved The World
Join Date: Apr 2008
Posts: 3,824
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. John 13:34 I think you need to pray-read John 13:34 over and over until you get it. I believe this verse encapsulates the thrust of what Sons To Glory! was getting at in his opening post. He can certainly correct me if I'm wrong. -
__________________
αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων ἀμήν - 1 Peter 5:11 |
|
06-07-2018, 11:01 AM | #10 |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Well now . . . this discussion went in a direction I didn't anticipate!
So I began this thread with sharing my experience of what the Lord showed me. I don't know so much about the paths others were led on, but this is the one He led me on. When I saw the underlying motive for it all was His love for us, that is when scriptures opened to me in a fresh way. And what I have seen about life since has been in the perspective of His love motive. It's why He came. It's why He endured - for the joy set before Him (us) - becoming the One Grain that fell into the ground to die, to BRING US FORTH IN LIFE. Why? He loves us. So why do we get His life? He loves us. Why does He want His Son revealed in us? He loves us. Why does He give us His glory and wants us in the one fellowship? He LOVES us! It is the answer to all the whys - why He came and did all of it. Like little children, we can ask why, why why. Why? He loves us. And in love for us, He took care of the righteous requirement and all things that stand in our way from enjoying a loving relationship with Him and others. I can think of only two things the Bible specifically says God is - "God is love" and "God is light." (both pronounced by the "love apostle") (But of course, we can go to an unhealthy extreme and start to imagine things that aren't in scripture, like advocating universalism, or complete prosperity, or no accountability, and the such.) |
06-07-2018, 12:26 PM | #11 | |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: Greater Ohio
Posts: 13,693
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
__________________
Ohio's motto is: With God all things are possible!. Keeping all my posts short, quick, living, and to the point! |
|
06-07-2018, 12:34 PM | #12 |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
|
06-07-2018, 01:21 PM | #13 | |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Posts: 8,064
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
__________________
Cults: My brain will always be there for you. Thinking. So you don't have to. There's a serpent in every paradise. |
|
06-07-2018, 08:18 PM | #14 |
Guest
Posts: n/a
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
God is not just loving, God IS love.
It’s quite ironic for me to see those who holds “if we believe the bible to be true...” etc etc to say that the fact that God is love is less important than that God is life. It’s the same God. Don’t carve yourself an idol or your own image of a god who is less than our Lord Jesus Christ who embodies love and life to be fullest. I used to be someone who rolls my eyes over the overuse of God is love until the spirit really opens me up with real experience of who He is as love - Paul asks the church to grasp together the dimensions of God’s love. |
06-07-2018, 08:43 PM | #15 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
Sons to Glory has explained that God's motive for giving us life is love. Actions are more important than motives in this instance, because it is concerned with saving souls from eternal destruction. What's more important is the life, not the motive that God had in giving it. Well Jesus dying to give life (not love) makes life more important. This is also implicit in the gospel tracts where belief in Christ for eternal life is deemed more important than obedience to the 10 commandments (including the 2 love commandments). Every gospel tract starts with us being sinners and deserving death, and we need to believe and receive life. John 10:28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. Mark 10:45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matt 20:28 even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” John 10:10 I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 6:27 Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.” Jesus dying on the cross is about Him giving His life in place of our (sinful) life so we may have eternal life. The problem was not that humankind lacked love, the problem was they were dead in sins and lacked life. This makes life more important than love. We could put it like this: God's life gave life to mankind (Adam and Eve, creation). Mankind lost God's life (the fall), so in sending Christ, God gave mankind life back (action) because of His love ( motive). The reason God sent His Son to die is less important than giving us the opportunity to be saved eternally. With the "golden verse" John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son People often put emphasis on the "For God so loved the world" part, but the emphasis should be on the "he gave his one and only Son" part because that is the one important act by which we may have eternal life. Go back one verse, and we can see that the context is about having life, not love: John 3:15 that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him." Go back two verses and we see that it relates to the bronze snake on the pole: John 3:14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, God sent poisonous snakes, those who were bitten died, any who had faith and looked upon the bronze snake were given life. This is not as much a love story as some make it out to be, it's a story of life and death, punishment and forgiveness. Remember that the loving God who gave life was also the one who sent the poisonous snakes because He is just. This answers a typical question "if God loves us why did Jesus have to die, couldn't he just refuse to punish us and forgive us?". So God's justice and love must be considered in balance. |
|
06-07-2018, 09:00 PM | #16 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-07-2018, 09:07 PM | #17 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
"We receive life from God and we give love to others by giving God's life to them." ? |
|
06-07-2018, 09:49 PM | #18 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-07-2018, 11:23 PM | #19 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
John 15:13 Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. His life is the most valuable thing that Christ could give. Therefore, life is more important than love. Gen 2:7, Job 33:4, Acts 17:25, Nehemiah 9:6 all show that life was mentioned in the Bible first before love, and it is God's life which sustains all things. |
|
06-08-2018, 12:07 AM | #20 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-08-2018, 03:25 AM | #21 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Don't worry, it's typical for most Christians to under appreciate life and focus too much on love. Not saying you are doing that but that is my point. I believe this is due to over-emphasis of John 3:16 which is just one of many verses in the Bible, but for some reason dominates Evangelical theology to the detriment of other verses. Statements such as "it's all 'bout love" are really unhelpful when trying to convert people dead in sins who need life more than love. Like an ER patient needs life more than love. Anyone who knows anything about evangelism knows that they can't start with "God loves you" because it will leave them confused about why God would send them to hell if he loves them if they don't believe in Christ.
|
06-08-2018, 04:57 AM | #22 | |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: Greater Ohio
Posts: 13,693
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
__________________
Ohio's motto is: With God all things are possible!. Keeping all my posts short, quick, living, and to the point! |
|
06-08-2018, 05:02 AM | #23 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
My point is, it's easier to explain the gospel from the point of view of life and death, not love. People who do "love evangelism" get tongue tied into all sorts of arguments with unbelievers about why would a loving God send them to hell if they don't accept Christ.
|
06-08-2018, 05:56 AM | #24 | |
Member
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: Greater Ohio
Posts: 13,693
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
__________________
Ohio's motto is: With God all things are possible!. Keeping all my posts short, quick, living, and to the point! |
|
06-08-2018, 09:03 AM | #25 |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
And when you ask "why" enough you eventually get to the ultimate conclusion - which is simply He love us.
Now based on that love He created us and wanted to fill us with the best - Himself. Many sons brought into glory. Why? You know . . . |
06-08-2018, 09:05 AM | #26 | |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-08-2018, 03:26 PM | #27 | |
Guest
Posts: n/a
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
I know you only wanna hear what you wanna hear. I don’t even want to make a comment here but lord have mercy on me. I love His love AND His life which is among His body. |
|
06-08-2018, 03:27 PM | #28 |
Guest
Posts: n/a
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Amen! Praise the Lord!
|
06-08-2018, 07:16 PM | #29 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
God is wonderous that even though we might start with experiencing only one of His attributes, we would eventually be led into the others. "All about love", "all about light", "all about holiness", "all about righteousness"... - they have no conflict. You don't experience one less when you truly experience another one more. That is why I propose we should not and cannot compare which is more important. After all, it is all about God. |
|
06-08-2018, 07:52 PM | #30 | |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-08-2018, 08:47 PM | #31 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
Gods love cannot be fully understood. But I know its all about being a God-man ha ha. Joking. |
|
06-08-2018, 08:54 PM | #32 | |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
Great points about life and love thanks for sharing. The LC is part of evangelical Christianity so the name is suitable I think. |
|
06-08-2018, 08:58 PM | #33 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
|
06-08-2018, 09:00 PM | #34 |
Member
Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Billy Graham didnt do followup so probably never got challenged about his message. Many times people can question why a loving God would send to hell and its not just that God sends to hell but thats where people deserve to go.
|
06-08-2018, 09:32 PM | #35 | |
Member
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 286
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
|
|
06-09-2018, 08:22 AM | #36 | |
Member
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Scottsdale, AZ
Posts: 2,617
|
Re: All About His LOVE!
Quote:
During my morning time it occurred to me that we're a little like the three blind men trying to describe the elephant! Therefore here's an idea - the "why" of it all is His love for us, and the "how" is His life. He loved us so much that He gave up His life - so that we could have His! |
|
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|