TOO LITTLE LOVE

This summer sizzled with intense heat and little and late rains. As I saw how it sapped the great Lake Superior (as well as lesser lakes), and as I heard of the toll taken by crops with the predictions of rising food costs, I thought often of the prophet Elijah.

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD
Elijah has long been a kindred heart to mine. I love his reckless abandon to Yahweh as he sarcastically confronts the servants of Baal on proving beyond doubt the greatness of the One True God. I love his lonely independence and his zeal. These qualities I hold up as ideals for my own life to pursue.

But beyond all his successes, Elijah was—as Jesus' brother James wrote—"a man just like us." He suffered from depression after great victory. He threw a pity party that God had to crash. He grew weary and hungry.

But this is all history and not what I've been pondering. The significance of Elijah's story in today's drought is this: "he prayed earnestly that it would not rain and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops." 

Did you catch it? Does it confound you as well? He prayed for his own discomfort!

Do you love God that much? Do I?

As the summer blazed and I watched the puffs of clouds in the sky, many times I cried out for God's mercy on our land. I love rain and all the goodness it brings—the greening of grass and flowers, the wafting fragrance through the air, the filling of the lakes, the feeling of its gentle touch falling on my face.

But what if God asked me to pray for drought? What if His good for our people required suffering so that we all might call on His name? Do I love Him enough to suffer three and a half years (or more) so that He might be praised?

Don't get me wrong. I don't actually think I'm a prophet or that this is my gift to call on Him for such a thing. It only serves to stir my heart with the question: do I love Him enough to suffer for His glory?

LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOUR AS YOURSELF

19My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back, 20remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

The world and the church today tout the word "tolerance" as the key to unity and peace. Is it?

Others have raised this question: Would you rather be tolerated or loved?

I understand the world's concern. In their desire to cling to their pseudo-independence, the conclusion has to be that each would leave the other alone. But in the church, is there room for tolerance?

Tolerance and mindless deference to the authority of state describe Germany in the 1930s and 40s. Precious few awoke in the church to "obey God rather than man."  The convenience of living a private "Christianity" outweighed the moral outcry of injustice and murder. They descended into their spiritual bunkers and withered to nothing.

The flip side of that extreme is judgement. The feeling that I can discern and, therefore, condemn your motives.

Both of these attitudes are such delicious concoctions of the enemy. How gloating and self-congratulating he must be as he looks at the West and our tug-of-war extremes!

James, in his book, (and as so many others in the Bible have taught) cries out against these polar mind-frames. He calls us neither to judge the motives of a brother nor to leave a fellow sinner to wander unchecked onto the edge of destruction without reaching out to catch him and pull him back.

WHAT'S THE CONCLUSION?
So what's the answer? I could not improve upon James' no-nonsense instructions.

1. Fill your life with God. 7Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
2. Know your own sin & repent. 8Come near to God and He will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded...10Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will lift you up.
3. Throw off worldly pursuits & pursue living out God's Word. 21Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.22Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
4. Watch what you say. 26If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.
5. Your love for others will show by what you do and for God by what you avoid. 27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
6. Know God's mercy in your life & give that mercy to everyone else. 12Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, 13because judgement without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgement!

Love is an action. Love is a pursuit. Love does not go on vacation, and its Source is God.