A DIFFICULT CHURCH CONCEPT

I share with you an item of discomfort.  Oh, when I initiate the topic most will most likely shrug with So?  However, I proceed to share my dis-ease realizing you may tend to brush it off.

I speak of the love of God. 

Do you think that we have discussed this, studied this, inquired of this theme to the point of near disinterest?  Has John 3:16 become an and what else verse?  Next?  And? Has Christendom shed its desperation for God's love; traded it for meaningful rules of engagement?

God's love should still hit us with deep awe and robust thunder.  He loves us!

Something has dented this Divine Shine upon mankind.  That infraction has come from our incessant need of being right.  Religious man's regulatory rightness has replaced Jesus' loving righteousness.  Period.  We have taken over the Kingdom and wielded the Bible as our conquering sword for being right.

Therefore, I propose that a difficult concept for the church is that love trumps doctrine.  Ooops.  I said it aloud.  Love trumps doctrine because love is the top doctrine.

Jesus was constantly confronted by the Doctrinairs of his time.  Mt. 12 is one place where Jesus had to decide; love the man with the lame hand and heal him or stick by the doctrinal law.  After all, the Doctrinairs were standing by to see how this would go.

Recall Mt. 10 where Jesus tells the disciples to deal only with the Jews; that was the doctrine of the day.  So they did.  Yet, in Mt. 15 these come upon a Gentile who is calling out for assistance and they tell her to step back.  They faithfully obeyed Jesus.  When she wouldn't back off, they referred to Jesus. 

He told her to back off.  That was the doctrinal scheme. 

She wouldn't.

Jesus yielded and blessed her.  Love for a person trumped the doctrine.

Are we to be doctrineless?  May it never be.  What we might want to recall is loving God and loving our neighbors, He said, are our two greatest commandments.  What this does is challenge us to love people over loving church rules. 

This IS a most difficult church concept.  Quite frankly, I have miserably failed.