If God is love…why aren’t you?

My friend Jen shared a message by Jentezen Franklin with me Monday. It was a sermon he had preached once before but now after writing a book, Love Like You’ve Never Been Hurt, it had a new, deeper meaning to him. It was a beautiful message in which he said these very profound words: “Christians aren’t supposed to be mean”. Jen and I ended up having a conversation about the message in which I told her a story I had just recounted to her daughter after she told me how she had been treated post giving her honest testimony to some fellow Christians.

I have a cousin who is gay. He has a sweet, tender heart. He struggles with his faith, in my opinion in part because it is popular within the Christian culture to say you cannot be both a believer and gay. I disagree. I know plenty of people who willingly sin and sit in church next to you on Sunday. Neither of you question his faith because his sin is acceptable to you, but God says clearly in Romans 6:23 that the wages of sin is death and I don’t remember reading a list of which sins lead to death following that statement, do you?

I went to visit him once while he was living in Los Angeles. We went out to a bar to have a drink and meet some of his friends, one of which I ended up having a conversation about faith. He asked how I reconciled loving my cousin when the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. I explained to him that I wasn’t his judge and I did not want him to be mine. He said yeah but… and I interrupted him describing a teenage girl who had two abortions and grew up to marry an addict and alcoholic who hurt both her and their children. I told him that I didn’t want him judging my sin of “thou shalt not kill” anymore that I wanted to judge his sin of “a man should not lie with another man as he lies with a female”. I need grace. You need grace. We all need grace. God is love and if I am striving to be like Him then I need to be loving. It is my job to love you not to judge you. Love brings you closer to Him. Judgement does not. He wrapped his arms around me with tears in his eyes, put his head on my chest (why do gay men love boobs) and said, “I wish we all could just love each other like that”. This man was out of touch with his Christian family because they did not approve of his lifestyle choices. They had not spoken to him in over three years.

Jen’s brother is the associate pastor at our church. Jake recently asked us why we give more grace to backsliding Christians than we do the unsaved. Powerful question. The Christian should know better while the sinner has yet to learn.

Luke 12:47-48 states: “Every servant who knows full well what pleases his master, yet who does not make himself ready and refuses to put his master’s will to action, will be punished with many blows. But the servant who does not know his master’s will and unwittingly does what is wrong will be punished less severely. For those who have received a greater revelation from their master are required a greater obedience. And those who have been entrusted with great responsibility will be held more responsible to their master.”

As a believer, I wear a much greater responsibility to do what is His will. It is not my job to rank sin and decided who gets grace and who doesn’t.  It is my job to love according to the love I have been given.

“Those who are loved by God, let his love continually pour from you to one another, because God is love. Everyone who loves is fathered by God and experiences an intimate knowledge of him. The one who doesn’t love has yet to know God, for God is love. The light of God’s love shined within us when he sent his matchless Son into the world so that we might live through him. This is love: He loved us long before we loved him. It was his love, not ours. He proved it by sending his Son to be the pleasing sacrificial offering to take away our sins. Delightfully loved ones, if he loved us with such tremendous love, then “loving one another” should be our way of life!” 1 John 4:7-11 (emphasis mine).

If you were raised in the South, then you at some point have heard someone somewhere tell you: you attract more bees with honey than vinegar … this holds true for us as believers. I don’t know a single person, including myself, who wants to go into a church knowing they will receive nothing but judgment, criticism and hatred. Until we grasp that love is at the root of the great commission, we will fail as the church.

Last time I referred to story about my church and the love that can be found there. Kneeling at our tiny i.e. VERY short altar, realizing what God was asking of me… I might have… not knowing anyone was near because my hair covers a multitude of sin as well as my face and saying it very softly, so it wasn’t truly or, so I thought inaudible… said shit.

YES! Literally, as God revealed His truth to me, crying and almost prostrate at the altar, I said, “shit”. Unbeknownst to me, my pastor, Warren, was right above me and without missing a beat, reached down, touched my shoulder and said, “Lord, in the name of Jesus, I pray the shit out of Tiffany. Amen!”. He laughed and told me to text him what that was all about later. He didn’t judge me for cussing at the altar.  He loved me right where I was at and it is love like that that changes the world. It is unconditional and all encompassing. It makes you feel like you can move a mountain with a mustard seed of faith. It gives you the knowledge that no matter how you feel, you know you are never truly alone. It teaches you to give grace and mercy, throwing judgement out the window, leaving it to God alone to handle. It helps you understand that being vulnerable is a strength not a weakness which in turn allows you to throw your arms again and again around the neck of someone that feels like they don’t deserve it. It brings you back to a church filled with it because inside there is no fear of condemnation just the soothing hug of acceptance.

LOVE IS THE REMEDY!

Remedy by Zac Brown... because he picked up on a universal truth like no other, I suggest we sing along:

I’ve been looking for a sound
That makes my heart sing
Been looking for a melody
That makes the church bells ring
Not looking for the fame
Or the fortune it might bring
In love, in music, in life

Jesus preached the golden rule
Buddha taught it too
Gandhi said eye for an eye
Makes the whole world go blind
With a little understanding
We can break these chains
That we've been handed
I've got the medication
Love is the remedy

Pray to be stronger and wiser
Know you get what you give
Love one another
Amen (amen), amen

I’ve been thinking about the mark
That I’ll be leaving
Been looking for a truth
I can believe in
I got everything I need
Let this heart be my guide
In love, in music, in life

I’m not saying I’m a wise man
Heaven knows there’s much that I’m still finding
Making my way down this winding road
Holding on to what I love
Yeah, and leaving the rest behind
For love, for music, for life

Pray to be stronger and wiser
Know you get what you give
Love one another

(Love is the remedy)
We’re all in this world together
Life’s a gift that we have to treasure
Happiness, now that is the measure
Love is the remedy
(Love is the remedy)

Everyone can be forgiven
One love and one religion
Open up your heart and listen
Love is the remedy

Pray to be stronger and wiser
And know you get what you give
God is love one another
Amen (amen), amen, amen (amen)