I read 2 Thessalonians today and the verse that stuck out to me was 2:10 "for those who perish because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved."
1. My first reaction to reading the verse was that people had not shared the love - which is the truth. People are perishing because people didn't share.
2. Commentaries tell me that what they are saying here is that these people are perishing because they did not love THE truth.
Do you see the difference in these two statements?
What I wonder is.. can love & truth be synonomous? (big word for this early in the morning!) sometimes?
I think both statements could be true..
1. People need us to share THE love (which requires that we share the truth).
*Have you ever thought that if God had never given us truth but had said that He loves us - we wouldn't have the same level of respect or awe for His love? I mean, He loves us with all of our sin and He is very upfront with us about sin. He doesn't do one at a time.. truth & love come hand in hand.
2. The commentaries make this about the lack of receiving done by the person perishing. Because they did not RECIEVE. They didn't take truth and love it.
Reading this in context seems to say that the commentaries are probably right. If it was trying to make my point I think Paul would have spent more time on it because it would have been an exhortation to love people with Truth. If you are serious about loving someone and they back off because you have shared truth, if you don't budge on how much you love them.. you have done what God has called us to. I've seen it happen, God's love can win someone over - even through their shame, fear, anger, frustration or whatever is holding them back.
So, my point - hopefully pulling from God's wisdom, not just my own - is that we don't have to decide between love or truth. We can't love without truth! So, if we are following the greatest commandment (to love God.. and then to love People) we are going to be right on!
Dahlia: My Cello Performance
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4 comments:
Reminds me of some verses in John about light and darkness.
John 3:19
"This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil."
Light (in my John study i havent quite fleshed this out yet, but i am going to speak anyway) can be closely associated with truth. Men like the darkness because they feel like they can hide. In light truth is revealed.
Have you ever had that feeling, after you have done something that deep inside you know was wrong, but rather than confess the truth, you hide yourself in the darkness of lies, excuses, and feeble justifications? For me it almost feels like a tightness in my stomach with a twinge of guilt and a small bit of stress. Or have you ever had that feeling, like a physical burden was lifted mixed with a handful of humiliation, when you bring into the light some lie you have been having yourself believe (the physical feeling especially seems to occur when you are actually bringing to light some sin to someone who has been harmed by it)? Maybe im the only one.
No. You are not the only one. The physical is so intermixed with the spiritual. Most of the time people (I'm totally guilty of this) try to seperate them.. in the book I am reading - which is just fiction but has made me think about the reality of the Kingdom (a theme in John?) - made a statement about how God created man but He wasn't done with the creation until He breathed life in to the physical body. He only did this with humans.. He didn't bother breathing life into the cattle or the ham, I mean pigs. We are essentially physical & spiritual. So they do affect one another. Crazy huh? Seems logical to seperate them.
That's all.
Hmmn...you got the wheels squeeking! Thanks! Miss you!
A few things come to mind after i read this. One being, as you said "people need us to share the love". My first thought is, without us sharing Love, we can't win the privilege or win there trust enough to be able to share the Truth. God has given us a big responsibilty and honor to share this gift to others. I believe that a seed is planted in each of us to search for the truth from the beginning, but we are given the choice to receive the truth and water or just to let it rot.
But i also think of people who i've been praying for for 10 years who, as far as i know, haven't chosen to love the truth as we have. It used to drive me crazy because i saw some of the same things as she did with someones life be drastically changed because of the Truth. But it was seen with a shrug and grunt and not a eyes that were open to how amazing and life changing Truth is.
There are moments when i drives me crazy that i can't relate to not knowing the Gift has been given to us. For as long as i can remember it's been lived in front of me and i chose to grasp onto it from an early age. but at the same time because of this i tend to keep it at an arms length and i forget how important it is to share the truth. I'm a selfish hyprocrite most of the time and i know there's been times when i've had oppurtunities to share when i haven't because fear of rejection has taken over.
Sorry i kind went off on my own track but i guess i needed to look at it from a different perspective also cause i've been thinking a lot about it.
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