“And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.” (Matthew 24:12)
Has your love grown cold?
The love of many has grown cold in America (and around the world,) which explains why so many today prefer hatred of enemies over Christ’s law of enemy love.
Enemy love is an unpopular message both in the pews and the pulpits. (Let alone outside the four walls of the church.)
When we hate our enemies, we become what we hate.
This is the way of death.
The way of life is found in peace and love with both friends and enemies.
We know this because of the nonviolent love of both friends and enemies modeled by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
The way of life is the way of peace not found in carnal weapons.
The true gospel (GOOD news) of Jesus Christ is a gospel of peace that calls men to walk in the way of peace as they follow their Prince of Peace.
Press into Jesus for He is our peace.
Trust that there is a just Judge who always judges righteously and never repays evil for evil. He only returns good for evil for His nature is good, not evil. His means are always and only good and righteous. He will indeed repay all men according to their deeds. But because He is a just Judge whose ways are not our ways, we can trust His righteous judgment will be fair and restorative, not retributive.
The presence of evil does not make God evil.
Instead, His goodness OVERCOMES evil.
God does not do evil works, but only good works in grace.
God is love. Therefore, whatever He does is ALWAYS done in love, for He IS love.
He doesn’t just have love. He IS love.
We serve Love, in whom there is no evil.
Our perceptions of God are distorted by sin but can be healed by understanding that God looks like Jesus.
God is our Savior, not our killer.
When Jesus and man stood toe to toe, everyone learned who was the killer and who was the victim.
Man (Jews + Gentiles) was forever exposed as the violent killer — and God was man’s nonviolent victim.
We are the violent ones, not God.
Our violence makes us unlike God.
It is man that needs to repent of his violence, not God.
Jesus, the perfect man, was nonviolent in all of His ways. (See Isaiah 53:9) When we are perfected, we will be like Him, always nonviolent… perfect images of our nonviolent Father.
Man’s violence does not work the righteousness of God.
Man’s violence offends God because it is contrary to His nature.
How do we know?
Look at the life of Jesus.
Jesus killed and maimed no one, even though the Mosaic law demanded bloodshed.
If killing were good and godly, Jesus would have modeled it.
If violence were good and godly, Jesus would have modeled it.
Is a servant then greater than his Master? If He is indeed our only Master?
Stopping the cycle of violence begins with us. We must follow and preach the gospel of peace ourselves. We must lay our own carnal weapons down and take up our spiritual weapons that are mighty for stopping and silencing our enemies — without bullets.
When we see God rightly, we will see ourselves rightly.
This is repentance, which is the narrow road.
Grace and peace,
Jerry Robinson
P.S. If you are looking to sharpen your spiritual discernment, check out this new full-length teaching on discerning “good and evil” here.