God is love and following Christ

I've been thinking about 1 John 4:8 and the idea of following Christ (related to Matthew 6:10, John 14:6, and my old favorite, Matthew 25:31-46).

John says God is love. He did not say "God is similar to love," or "God is loving," or "God represents love." This is a direct equivocation between love and God: they are one in the same entity. Insofar as one understands love, they understand God. Insofar as someone is loving, they are Godly, as they follow the feelings and motivations of love, they are following God.

'God' is not by any means a concrete concept. It is abstract and not directly accessible. Given how often God tells one person one thing, then tells someone else something contradictory, it's clear that the nature of God is not easy to acquire. On the other hand, love is something we experience every day and is real and tangible. Since they are the same thing, one can ignore the abstract side of it, the God part, and move directly to love. It is much easier to answer the question "Is it loving?" than "Is it Godly?" Everyone has an idea of what love is, even if they rarely live up to their concept of it. They can be loving, or not loving, and since God is love, so too do they follow or not follow God.

This must carry over to Christ, as well, since he is the avatar of God and therefore not superior to God. This is particularly clear when considering how Christ's words must have been received while he was still living. A living, breathing Christ does not need to convince people to believe that he exists, since he obviously does. Nor does he base his supplications on a hat trick to be performed later, but instead on the idea of God and what is and isn't Godly.

Keeping in mind that God is love, it's easier to understand what Christ means when he says that "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one goes to the Father except through me." The path to God leads through Christ. Jesus is asking people to follow and believe in him, but not to literally walk behind him, nor merely his existence, but instead in the love which he lives out and speaks of. To follow Christ, then, is to follow the course of love which he has plotted. To believe in him is to believe in the sanctity of this love.

Some aspects of Christ-like love is explicit. He commands people to care for the needy in words as strong as they are clear: how you treat those in need is how you treat Christ himself. This much is without question. But the human experience is too complicated to rely on just the explicit parts of scripture; it's necessary to find a theme, and underlying motivation or set of motivations to navigate the kind of situations people find themselves in which aren't covered exactly by the text. The consistent theme of Jesus, and so of Christ-like love, must also be that of God, since Jesus can hardly be the son of God if he demonstrates and lives by a different kind of love, since that would literally mean he was following a different God.

The theme of Jesus involves a love for those whom society does not value. He also has little regard for the established holy men and their holy system of power. He eschews any violent opposition to unjust power, but resists and encourages resisting nonetheless. He excises those old laws which no longer conform to the love of God, the love which is God. He has so little regard for material wealth that he tells the rich man to give away everything to the poor, and then follow Him. It is important to note that he does not say "continue to follow me," but rather "Then, come follow me." Follow Christ apparently begins with a radical disregard for personal wealth, rather than simply being improved by it.

This path can be followed today, but it doesn't much resemble what the contemporary church is doing. This is partially because the path of Christ is radical to an extreme degree. The path of Christ is not compatible with a 9 to 5 and a mortgage, and it certainly doesn't involve expensive suits and expensive cars, two items not uncommon at any given church.

The path of Christ, which is the love which is God, is, for the individual, an almost absolute disregard for one's own welfare in favor of others. It does not allow social norms, even and those set by the established church (!) to dictate who you are allowed to hate and neglect, since you aren't allowed to do that to anyone, but especially those who are already hated and neglected by society at large. A Jesus returned would be seen among drug dealers, whores, homeless people, gays, etc. and wouldn't bother with any gilded church beyond perhaps stopping in to tear apart the coffee shop and rip the hood ornaments off the Benz' all the while decrying the vanity and uselessness of the church.

For society, the theme of Jesus is this: whatever old laws and social norms do not lead to love and harmony must be discarded. Some laws and norms had apparently become unneeded from the time of the old testament to the time of Christ, so to extend this idea to today it is reasonable to think there are some rules and expectations which need to be done away with today, even if they are espoused by the established church. It is difficult to imagine Jesus approving of a social system which protects the wealth and privilege of the few at the expense of the many left to continue their suffering. It is also difficult to imagine a returned Jesus would approve of violence, whether performed as a nation against another nation or of groups of people against other groups.

Since God is love, and Jesus is the son of God, whomever loves as he loves is following God and following Christ. They don't need to even know the name "Jesus" in order to know and seek love. This is what Jesus must have meant when he said the only way to God is through him, since there was literally no tunnel through his body. Those who love are in Christ, those who hate are outside. It doesn't matter what precious lil' rituals one performs, if they fail to love those who society hates, they fail to follow Christ. Slapping a bumper sticker on your Cadillac which reads "My real treasure is in heaven" does not impress the man and God who commanded that you give away your luxuries to the poor. When it is written that the path is narrow and few will make it, it isn't referring to how small and exclusive your denomination is, but how hard it is to rise above the animal inside which is consumed with the need to be socially valued, to accumulate wealth, to obey the group and hate those which the group hates, to maim and kill other people simply for whatever reason at all, or even just to give a hoot about your fellow man.

So, to the reader and to my family who won't leave me alone about not being a Christian and going to hell blah blah blah, I say this: I'll keep on seeking to understand and practice love as best I can, and you keep doing whatever the established church tells you to do, and we'll just see who is goat in the end.

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If much in the world were mystery the limits of that world were not, for it was without measure or bound and there were contained within it creatures more horrible yet and men of other colors and beings which no man has looked upon and yet not alien none of it more than were their own hearts alien in them, whatever wilderness contained there and whatever beasts.

Oh I was gonna make a long reply to this ..but instead I'll just say this..

Be careful not to define God and how you read and understand His Word by YOUR definitions, but by HIS.

Don't bend His Word to match what you think and how you see things...YOU bend to match Him...


....and if I were going to reply in a longer way..I might even agree with some of the comments you made...but being "loving" will not save you.

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just heard some people talk about this yesterday. there are too many people who will put all the emphasis on a loving God, and they will neglect to mention all of His other attributes.

i believe the first thing we need to see when we think of God is His holiness and our sinfulness. everything else will fall into line when we get the right perspective.

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Do you want to be saved?
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God is perfect love
I like what you had to say but I am guessing that we probably do not agree on the specifics of what is love...
I do like your emphasise away from violense and away from materialism

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I can do all things through Him who gives me strength

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St. Raphael, Pray for us
O angel of God, my holy guardian, given to me from heaven, enlighten me this day, and save me from all evil. Instruct me in doing good deeds, and set me on the path of salvation. Amen.

Actually I thought it wasn't bad at all. Far too many are sin-centered rather than love centered. To be centered on sinfulness is error and will stumble you if you lose sight of God.


This is how we know what God's love is:
[/discussion]

Amen bro. You should read "Love Wins" by Rob Bell. From this post, I know you'll like it. I love what you said about how if Jesus was around today, he wouldn't be hanging around "churchy" people, but would be around the gays, prostitutes, drug addicts, the homeless, etc.

but yeah, Matthew 22:36-40

36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[c] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[d] 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

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The scandal of the gospel isn't that God is Jesus, it's that God is like Jesus.

"The main lie of modern Evangelical Christianity is that the love of God will spare you from all pain, suffering, anxiety, and even death. Not only has this contributed to it's discreditation, it is flat out WRONG. Even God did not spare His own son from these things" -Randy Harris

Originally Posted by acuwildcat147

Amen bro. You should read "Love Wins" by Rob Bell. From this post, I know you'll like it. I love what you said about how if Jesus was around today, he wouldn't be hanging around "churchy" people, but would be around the gays, prostitutes, drug addicts, the homeless, etc.

You shouldn't be reading Rob Bell's stuff....

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I agree.

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The scandal of the gospel isn't that God is Jesus, it's that God is like Jesus.

"The main lie of modern Evangelical Christianity is that the love of God will spare you from all pain, suffering, anxiety, and even death. Not only has this contributed to it's discreditation, it is flat out WRONG. Even God did not spare His own son from these things" -Randy Harris

Love God with all your heart
love others as you love yourself

that is what Jesus told us to do

__________________
I can do all things through Him who gives me strength

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St. Raphael, Pray for us
O angel of God, my holy guardian, given to me from heaven, enlighten me this day, and save me from all evil. Instruct me in doing good deeds, and set me on the path of salvation. Amen.

Here's the question of the day:

Is there a difference between loving God in spirit, and loving others as ourselves?