{"id":134,"date":"2012-06-07T08:57:09","date_gmt":"2012-06-07T08:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/meditations.kafkasworld.com\/dir\/?p=134"},"modified":"2012-06-07T08:57:09","modified_gmt":"2012-06-07T08:57:09","slug":"the-love-that-isnt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/06\/07\/the-love-that-isnt\/","title":{"rendered":"The Love that Isn\u2019t"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n
The Love that Isn\u2019t
\nCopyright 2011 by Shea Oakley
\nAll rights reserved<\/p>\n

We cannot love others in order to win God\u2019s love towards us. To the Biblically literate Christian this may seem like an obvious statement, one so integral to the message of the New Testament that it hardly needs to be stated. But, unfortunately, like other apparently basic realities revealed by the Word of God, this truth is hard for many a struggling believer in Jesus Christ to live out.<\/p>\n

The Bible makes it clear that \u201cWe love because He first loved us\u201d and that apart from Him we can do nothing. The implication is clear. We love others because we are loved by God and have received that love, not so we can obtain His love in the first place.<\/p>\n

This is, of course, a variation on the theme of the futility of working for our salvation. It is a theme central to true Christianity. Our good works are only real, and only pleasing to God, if they come as a result of a saving relationship in Christ, a relationship that only His work on the cross makes possible. We do not work to become saved or stay saved. We work because we are saved, because the result of our being grafted into the true vine that is the resurrected Son of God is the fruit of good works.<\/p>\n

This \u201cfruit of the Spirit\u201d is largely made manifest in the form of sincere love towards other human beings, the kind of love that often results in helping others in a personally costly way. Yet, despite the cost, this kind of helping is something we want to do. There is little or no sense of compulsion in doing it. If anything it is a joy. This is because the love of Christ inhabits us and fills us with love like His own. In some sense it then \u201coverflows\u201d out of us and onto others.<\/p>\n

This seems so simple a concept. Our Lord and Savior is the vine and we are the branches. Branches do not toil to produce leaves and fruit; they do so because the vine to which they are attached provides the power for them to do so. So when a child of God truly loves he or she is acting as a vessel of the Supreme Lover. We love because we receive Christ\u2019s love for ourselves, and that love is naturally extended to those around us, at least if we co-operate with God in being personally willing to love others.<\/p>\n

It seems simple but actually living it out appears difficult if not impossible for many a professing Christian. Why? We must return to the unpleasant reality that our fallen nature, our \u201cflesh\u201d, is all about earning everything we need to survive and what is more needful to every human being than love, both received and given? Often added to our intrinsic tendency towards trying to \u201cearn love\u201d (which is a profound oxymoron, by the way) is damage we have received from other fallen beings who only loved us when we did something for their benefit.<\/p>\n

The blessed hope for the person who has tried, and invariably failed, to love people in order to \u201cmake\u201d God love them is the persistence of divine grace. Over time the genuine love of Christ can break through to gently convict the heart of one caught up in the futility of insincere, flesh-driven \u201clove\u201d. This may take time, even a long time but God has a way of bringing us to the end of our rope of self-effort. It is only then that we can become open to the love Christ freely gives. At that point we have a choice to allow this kind of love into our hearts of hearts or continue in the bondage of a truly loveless existence. By the mercy of our God may we all finally make the choice to receive the perfect and unconditional love made manifest on the cross of His only begotten Son\u2026.and then give it away.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Love that Isn\u2019t Copyright 2011 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved We cannot love others in order to win God\u2019s love towards us. To the Biblically literate Christian this may seem like an obvious statement, one so integral to the message of the New Testament that it hardly needs to be stated. But, unfortunately,… <\/p>\n

Read more The Love that Isn\u2019t<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-christian","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6GkOA-2a","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":372,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2013\/05\/09\/when-good-works-arent-really-good\/","url_meta":{"origin":134,"position":0},"title":"When Good Works Aren\u2019t Really Good","date":"May 9, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"When Good Works Aren\u2019t Really Good Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved \u201cFor it is by grace you have been saved, through-and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-not by works, so that no one can boast.\u201d Ephesians 2:8-9 Our truest good works are a function\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/07\/i-am-gods-and-god-is-mine\/","url_meta":{"origin":134,"position":1},"title":"I am God\u2019s and God is Mine","date":"April 7, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"It is not unusual to hear messages in our churches exhorting us to give ourselves away to God. The theme of total surrender is perennial in the pulpit, as indeed it should be. One of the categorical imperatives of the Christian walk is to allow our Master to have all\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1568,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/11\/what-does-the-bible-really-have-to-say-about-alcohol\/","url_meta":{"origin":134,"position":2},"title":"What Does the Bible Really Have to Say About Alcohol?","date":"December 11, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2024 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved I completely abstained from any consumption of alcohol for the first 26 years of my Christian walk. I\u2019ve been a believer for 34. There were a host of reasons for my deciding to abstain during that time including, frankly, pride about my\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":125,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2012\/05\/31\/forgetfulness-and-dying-to-self\/","url_meta":{"origin":134,"position":3},"title":"Forgetfulness and Dying to Self","date":"May 31, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Forgetfulness and Dying to Self Copyright 2011 by Shea Oakley All rights reserved Living out the Christian life requires dying to self. This is a recurring and primary theme in the New Testament. For many earnest believers it is also a theme which causes some puzzlement. 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In an era\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Christian"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":589,"url":"https:\/\/sheaoakley.com\/index.php\/2014\/11\/06\/arrogance-or-truth\/","url_meta":{"origin":134,"position":5},"title":"Arrogance or Truth?","date":"November 6, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright by Shea Oakley All rights reserved A common criticism of biblically-faithful Christianity is that it is an inherently arrogant belief system. The core of this arrogance is believed to be the claim that the only way to God is through faith in Jesus Christ. 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