Love and Forgiveness Foundational

Love and forgiveness are foundational to Christianity. If someone does not understand the workings of love and forgiveness they will not be able to live the Christian life as God intended.

Christ told us to confess our sin to be cleansed by Him. 1 John 1:9. He commanded us to operate the same way with our fellow man. We confess to God our sinfulness and a desire to be changed by Him and in response, He forgives us and changes how we think which changes how we live.

We confess our sin to the one we have offended and the one offended forgives to restore the relationship. When we confess our sin against another person it is an expression of a desire to change our behavior toward that person. When there is no confession of sin and no desire to change there can be no reconciliation with the offended party.

Our culture as a whole does not understand God's forgiveness or the need for confession to be reconciled. We have been taught by psychologists and would-be relationship experts in the church that we are to short-cut God's model of reconciling a relationship by leaving out important steps that remove guilt, cleanse from sin and restore trust to a relationship.

When a false Christian attempts to love and forgive they derail a relationship merely appearing to fix something broken when in fact, the relationship remains broken even growing worse because the necessary steps to reconciliation were not taken God's Way.

Why does our culture take shortcuts in forgiveness and love? The reason is simple since the culture is dedicated more to temporary personal feelings than they are to facts and authentic fixes they misinterpret God's word to fit their feelings. Did you know it is selfish to forgive an unrepentant sinner? Yes, I said that, when the purpose for forgiving becomes our own personal feeling of pride about how good we think we are, we are of no use to the offender in his cleansing and regeneration.

When we short-cut the gospel to make people "feel" good about themselves, either to feel good about themselves for forgiving prematurely or feel good about ourselves for making the sinner feel better about himself, we have acted selfishly.

Rather than to take the necessary difficult task of honesty and truth for reconciling with human relationships and reconciliation to God, through explaining the steps needed for repentance that lead to relationship reconciliation we have left a sinner without hope and those watching thinking no one ever has to confess their sin and never has to be sorry to gain heaven.

There is only one way to reconcile with God, which is to confess our sinfulness and desire Him to change us into a new creation.

There is only one way to reconcile with another human being and that is to confess our sin against them and desire to be forgiven by them. If there is no confession and no sorrow there is no forgiveness to reconcile.

There are those who would say "I forgive them but I can't be friends", that's because there has not been authentic forgiveness, there has been no confession or desire to change the behavior so there is no reconciliation.

To forgive God's way is the way of love.

Psalm 141:5

"Let the righteous man strike me; let his rebuke be an act of loving devotion. It is oil for my head; let me not refuse it. For my prayer is ever against the deeds of the wicked."

Immunity to the Devil's Tactics

We can become immune to the arrow of the devil merely by knowing his tactics and that has nothing to do with you.

If you have done something wrong the Holy Spirit will tell you. However, the devil will attempt to make you feel guilty about doing what God told you to do. You will be judged as bad for doing what is good.

We cannot change a toxic person, we can inform them, assess their response, and decide if this person is willing to change their behavior. If they will not we can walk detached from them feeling no sorrow over losing them as a companion.

Proverbs 13:20-21 "20 He who walks with the wise will become wise, but the companion of fools will be destroyed. 21 Disaster pursues sinners, but prosperity is the reward of the righteous."

We are not called to be friends with everyone we meet. We are commanded not to keep company with those who have resisted the gospel and hate righteous living.

Proverbs 2:20

"So you will follow in the ways of the good, and keep to the paths of the righteous."

In order to walk with Christ every day we must choose our constant companions wisely, they must love Christ as we love Christ.

We are commanded to speak the truth of the gospel to those who are perishing but we are not called to become friends with them when they choose to reject Christ. To reject Christ is to reject us, we are the temple of the Holy Spirit.

It will be harder in our day to have companions because the world has become "ragingly insane" as one sister put it one day as we were discussing the end times mentality of many if not most people including in the churches that have become apostate.

James 1:5-8

"5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.

6 But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.

7 That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. 8 Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do."

Obeying God Rather than Man

If you are depending on relatives to save you from hell as though their salvation somehow gets you and "in" the door to heaven, no one can do that for anyone else.

No one will be judged by Christ based on who they knew or who prayed for them. Everyone must stand before Christ all on their own.
No one will be able to say, "but Lord, my husband, father, uncle, commanded me to sin against you.
If you have doubts about this just read the story of Abigail in the Bible who knew her husband had made a very bad decision against God. Abigail defied her husband's wishes in order to honor God and brought safety to her household because of it.
Nowhere in the Word of God are we told to obey the authorities over us if they are commanding us to disobey God's standards and principles.
Love your husband enough to do what is right to honor God. We honor someone by doing what is best for them, not what they want which is evil. Follow the link below to read the story. 

OTQUESTIONS.ORG

Who was Abigail in the Bible? | GotQuestions.org

Who was Abigail in the Bible? Why was Abigail married to Nabal? Why did Abigail agree to become David’s wife?

Who Is Your God?

Ladies, your husband is not your mediator between you and God, Jesus Christ is the only mediator between us and God.

Those Who are Born-Again have the Fulness of Christ in Them

Amen, Amen!!!! It follows that since we are in the fullness of Christ we will not need any man to teach us, after all, who can teach us better than Christ. When other men teach us we evaluate them according to God's word and the Holy Spirit, so really when another man is teaching he is really sharing as we evaluate what he says.

Other men do not have authority over us in terms of teaching, they have a gift given by the Holy Spirit to share with us as we also share with them.

1 John 2:27

"27 And as for you, the anointing which you received from Him remains in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you remain in Him."

John 16:13-14 "13 However, when the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth. For He will not speak on His own, but He will speak what He hears, and He will declare to you what is to come. 14 He will glorify Me by taking from what is Mine and disclosing it to you.…"

These words were instructions given to all born-again believers. Everyone who has the Holy Spirit living in them can teach, preach and instruct others. Men have the role of teaching in the church, women also teach women and children, and both men and women preach the gospel outside the church.

Men and women alike share wisdom with all believers in the church and outside the church system. The men lead and the women share as the men teach. No one who has the Holy Spirit is excluded from teaching and sharing each within their god-ordained roles.

John 14:17

"the Spirit of truth. The world cannot receive Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you do know Him, for He abides with you and will be in you."

John 14:26

"But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have told you."

Never allow another human being to silence you when you are being led by the Holy Spirit.

Men will use many ploys to silence you, they will tell you since you don't have a seminary degree you cannot know the truth, as though the Holy Spirit only goes to seminary. They will attempt to convince the pew people are not led by the Holy Spirit.

Men will attempt to silence women by telling them they may not speak things of the word of God to men or anyone, that only men must do this. There is no scriptural basis for women to live in complete silence about the gospel or Bible teaching.

Every false doctrine is based on a short passage taken out of context to make it say what those who teach it want it to say to control the people.

Spiritual leadership does not control others through false doctrine and intimidation. Leaders are to lead by example and teaching and must be teachable themselves.

Everyone is to submit to everyone else allowing the Holy Spirit to speak through every single believer. If one person has a disagreement the first speaker is to stop and listen, then they are both to go to the word together as well as pray for the Holy Spirit to make clear the truth that they might agree.

Those who refuse to pray and study with someone because they count themselves as an authority over others is disqualified to teach.

2 Timothy 2:23-25 "…23 But reject foolish and ignorant speculation, for you know that it breeds quarreling. 24 And a servant of the Lord must not be quarrelsome, but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, and forbearing. 25 He must gently reprove those who oppose him, in the hope that God may grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth.…"

The phrase in this passage, "able to teach" is actually in Greek; "able to be taught." No one is above challenges in their teaching and no one carries so much weight in their teaching that they cannot be corrected when in error.

When we place a preacher or teacher above all other believers we have an idol and must repent.

No one has a "position" in the church that is above anyone else, all are equal in God's eyes and all need correcting and training in righteousness at times. Any man who is in leadership and arrogantly asserts that you may not correct him is not obeying the word of God. Leading is not "lording it over", intimidating or pressuring others, leading is by example and teaching only.

1 Peter 5:2-3 "…2 Be shepherds of God’s flock that is among you, watching over them not out of compulsion, but because it is God’s will; not out of greed, but out of eagerness; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. "

When we trust the Lord Jesus Christ and not men we will show respect to everyone no matter what their office in the church is and we will submit one to another unless those who demand submission are disobeying God. The "demanding obedience to them" is disobedience to God. This kind of leader must be removed, if no one will remove him then we must take ourselves from under his leadership and move on to a proper gathering with an eldership in which no one man rules and no one is paid money to serve.

Seek Christ in all things and you will not be subject to the foolishness of those who love to think more highly of themselves than they should.