Intelligent Love....or Blind Affection?

“And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment, that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense until the day of Christ…” Philippians 1:9-10 

A close look at Philippians 1 shows that God connects love, knowledge and discernment as a powerful, three-stringed cord. The combination of these three virtues enables us to test and examine all things and conclude whether they are genuine (sourced in God) or a promotion of the enemy’s vices for the destruction of mankind. 

Love’s influence increases and becomes more productive when empowered with knowledge and discernment: in today’s society this is extremely important. Today’s culture defines love as agreeing with (and promoting) the choices of others regardless of what the Bible says about those choices. But God’s delivering and healing love abounds and spreads its perfect aroma when it couples with knowledge and discernment to live and speak His truth in the face of decay and sin.

While we are to say ‘no’ to the ungodly values and actions of the world around us, and sometimes that includes our family members, co-workers and others we see on a daily basis, verse 10 tells us that we must not take offense in this process. To be offended is to fall into sin, ourselves, when others don’t agree with us as we stand for the Truth of God. 

The simple truth is that the world has a very unhealthy and deceived idea of love. God is love – and without God there is no authentic love! Love does not give permission and agreement to things that are ungodly because love desires the best for those it loves. 

What Paul was saying to the Philippians (and to us) is that God desires for us to have "intelligent love" not "blind affection." Intelligent love understands God's ways and seeks His purposes while blind affection seeks the approval of man and fears rejection. We love unconditionally, but we do so with the knowledge and discernment of God as the basis for our acceptance or rejection of the actions and beliefs of others.

He Ain't Heavy...He's My Burden!

The idea of bearing the burdens of others might bring to mind an image of young men helping elderly ladies cross the street. But Galatians 6 speaks of ‘bearing burdens’ in the context of carrying the heaviness and effects of another person’s sin.

Bearing the burdens of another means we purposefully intercede in the person’s life when he or she is caught in sin by both carrying the effects of that sin and restoring him to righteous living in Christ. God’s way of dealing with these sins is to have the brethren work with those who are caught unaware, overtaken by sin and spiritual weakness, or have wrongly learned that their sin is an acceptable way of living (Gal. 6:1). And maybe the sin has been there for a long time but has worsened, making it more noticeable and affecting the life of that person and others more drastically than before.

As an example, consider the person who struggles to budget his money, using it unwisely and habitually spending it on frivolities via credit cards. As debt builds, that person may suddenly find himself in need of funds to pay for food and shelter, and if there are children involved, the situation can quickly become desperate.

Galatians 6:1 says “you who are spiritual should restore him.” In other words, you who are solid in the Truth and Spirit of God should work with him to help him understand God’s Word, repent, and break free of sin and the misconduct that follows. But bearing the burden of his sin also means we shoulder some of the consequences; in the above example this may include helping support and feed his family while at the same time helping him to be delivered from the root of the sin and learn to use money in a God-honoring way. This is how we carry the heaviness of another person’s sin, shouldering the consequences with him while helping move him toward complete freedom.

A key component to bearing these burdens is to operate in meekness, patience and gentleness. We’re not to beat down or condemn the individual who is in this type of situation (Gal. 6:1). Honesty in love is a must, however, Galatians specifically tells us that we’re not to think of ourselves as better or more righteous or we may fall into sin while we’re carrying the burdens of others. This can happen if we walk in pride, become entangled in the very sin we’re striving to free them from, or teach the person to follow us more than Christ. Our goal is to help them get out of the sin which entangles them, but not at the risk of having them see us as their ‘end all be all’ instead of vessels of service to the Body of Christ.

If you’ve ever borne the burdens of others you know how frustrating it can be, especially when things don’t move along as quickly as you think they should. But shaking a finger, losing patience, scolding, condemning and spiritual bullying are signs that we’ve moved away from helping and slid into sin ourselves: this is nothing more than an abuse of God’s power and authority!

The truth is that we all have issues to work through at different times in our lives, and treating others with love and respect is likely the way we’d like to be treated as we work through our own grievous afflictions – self induced or otherwise. Just as Christ lovingly and sacrificially carried our burdens, we're to carry the burdens of others in bringing them to the fullness of Christ on this earth. And while we’re helping others to become whole and free in Christ, we may very well be planting a seed which will produce a harvest of help when we’re in need of someone to shoulder our burdens.

“If any person is overtaken in misconduct or sin of any sort, you who are spiritual [who are responsive to and controlled by the Spirit] should set him right and restore and reinstate him, without any sense of superiority and with all gentleness, keeping an attentive eye on yourself, lest you should be tempted also.  
Bear (endure, carry) one another's burdens and troublesome moral faults...for if any person thinks himself to be somebody [too important to condescend to shoulder another's load] when he is nobody… he deceives and deludes and cheats himself. But let every person carefully scrutinize and examine and test his own conduct and his own work. He can then have the personal satisfaction and joy of doing something commendable [in itself alone] without [resorting to] boastful comparison with his neighbor” (Gal 6:1-4 AMP).

Are We Building the Church...or the Tower of Babel?

A first look at the church in Ephesus can leave one feeling excited and encouraged about what they were accomplishing (Rev. 2:1-6). They had great church programs, labored diligently, and wouldn’t put up with nonsense from those who falsely called themselves apostles. In fact, Ephesus was a training ground for ministry workers, who then went out to labor in existing churches and do mission work in other areas of Asia.

But one ‘small’ problem existed in Ephesus which caused Jesus to say “I am going to shut you down if you don’t repent!” In all of their ‘doing’ they’d left behind their affections for God, laboring to build a church instead of serving the King of Kings! Jesus said it this way: “you have left your First Love.” 

Jeremiah warned the Israelites concerning this same sin: "Go and proclaim in the hearing of Jerusalem, this is what the LORD says: ‘I remember the devotion of your youth, how as a bride you loved me and followed me through the wilderness, through a land not sown. Israel was holy to the LORD…[but today], those who deal with the law do not know me, the leaders have rebelled against me.’” (Jer. 2:2,9)

If our affections aren’t on God we cannot minister His love to others – we love because He first loved us. And the power of the Gospel does not rest in human ability: the impetus behind spreading and teaching the Gospel is to bring the love of God to others. If we think we can build God’s church in the way that Ephesus did, we may actually be building the tower of Babel, a monument to man’s abilities, and God will eventually shut it down!

In contrast to Ephesus, the church of Thyatira tolerated a false teacher, reluctantly putting up with the spirit of Jezebel. But we’re specifically told that Smyrna had the love of God among them and labored in faith and patience in increasing degrees. Interestingly, Thyatira is not told that God would shut them down for tolerating the spirit of Jezebel, but Jesus specifically addressed the ‘prophetess’ who brought in this spirit and rebuked her.

The point here is not that it’s O.K. to tolerate wrong teaching and people who falsely call themselves prophets (or even teachers, pastors or apostles); Jesus addressed these issues separately from the ‘love’ issue. More importantly, God will not tolerate a church who has left Him as their first love, a church who is building man’s kingdom under God’s name. Jesus was addressing the heart of the matter: where the heart is, the life will follow. Unfortunately, Ephesus’ heart was not on God, but on their own abilities.

The conclusion for Ephesus was that they had “fallen” and needed to repent - all because of their lack of love for God (Rev. 2:5). More important than having correct doctrine and booting out false apostles and prophets, our love for God must be a burning flame within us which inspires us to build His kingdom for His glory!