Forgiveness without Love :Oxymoronic

Lie of the day; no lie of a lifetime! Read the quotation by Tony Gaskins (Figure #2: No Love with Forgiveness) and tell me what's wrong with it:

Are there merely two choices for people we know? Is it only love or hate or is their indifference?

Love is from God. "Non-love" is not from God:

1 John 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

This is extremely important for not only Christians, but any person! God is love. He is the author of "the value we place on people and God himself"! By "non-love" we just haven't met God yet, let alone submitted to his will! What is his will? To love him foremost and others just as we love ourselves!" (Matthew 22:36-40).

If there is "indifference" then it's not of God! Those created have value to God and the failure to love what God has created is sinful!

Children will say "I don't hate him; I just don't like him!" or "I like him as a friend, but don't love him!"

"Liking" is indifference in God's eyes. It's Satan's excuse for hating!

1 John 2:9 "He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now."

Since God is Light, outside that light is "darkness" and that's Satan's realm!

 John 8:12 "Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

Therefore, hate is darkness and "non-love" is as well. Only love is Light and love is God's will and command for us (John 14:15).  "Love" is not an emotion nor a choice. It's a command of God!

"Indifference" is not love. "Resentment" is not love and "shunning is not love!" How can we love a person that is excluded from fellowship? "I don't hate the guy; I just don't want to be around him!" Does that sound like love? Acts 1 teaches that all were in one accord before the Holy Spirit came. Some didn't love, others merely "tolerate" and others hate. Those at Pentecost were doing what God commanded: loving one another!

Is your church dead or dying? If so it's because of discord! It's people hating and indifference to others. It's because members just tolerate each other.

Why is there lack of love: hate, indifference, and resentment; all "un-love"? It's because Christians are not walking in Light. They are in darkness! If one sin was to exclude, it would be the sin of "non-love"! God says that those who fail to love are in darkness; the kingdom of Satan.

Let's look at what drives people away from love (follow Figure #1; Love and Forgiveness). Before we know people there is a kind of respect for each other. That is because he or she is a fellow human being and one of God's children. However, if one is not born-again as a new person, the inclination is to be at odds with that person. This is first impressions. Non-Christians, or those "in darkness" value superficial things. Christians are to view the person as a spiritual being with value.

So given that, Christians have a sort of love for the person. It would make us sorrowful if calamity happened. That care is love.

The non-Christian can have concern as well. They may value life because of humanitarian reasons, but for the most part, those in darkness don't have a spiritual love for individuals. They value the material, but the spiritual value they are indifferent or oblivious to it's existence. Godly love is valuing others because they are spiritually just as important as we are (love others as ourselves).

Once we know a person, the two different individuals (represented by circles) become closer and overlap. Two people who before were in separate worlds then share some common space between worlds. That common space is love. Because of common things we become attracted to one another. That common area is signified by the heart and is love. It's a mutual thing!

The hatched area common to both circles is friendship. Friendship is the bond between individuals and is the area of mutual love! Christians have a special bond between the two: they are both children of God and they love Jesus, the pattern for their very existence. There are many superficial things which create that bond. It may be common interests, personalities, character, vocations or whatever, but divine love is the common denominator in how Christians are friends.

The Greatest Commandment is a demonstration of that bond. Loving one another is a demonstration of loving God. Not loving God nor others is darkness.

What if one person is not a Christian? Then the other person makes up for it! Person #2 is to love the other without regard to the spiritual condition of Person #1. Why? Because God loves the sinner, then we are to do the same!

Romans 5:8 "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

So here is the gist of faulty thinking: "My lack of love is justified if someone wrongs me or if we are different!" What if Jesus thought that way? He loved us while we were yet sinners! Sinners do mean things, do sinful things and some even despise Jesus. Others rob banks, have orgies and even hate; yet to be like Jesus, we are to still love them!

Moving down the graphic (Figure #1) I demonstrate moving away from God's will. Remember that "our other god" is our "self", Satan's will is that friendships be broken. Why? Because love is the bond of which friendships are formed! By breaking the love bond, and severing friendships, Satan has by his wiles, demeaned and stolen from God. His child or children fail to love and are consumed by darkness. Light is not in them!

Figure #1: Love & Forgiveness

Friendships are a tight bond if they are glued with God's love. Satan wants to break that bond, but it's tight! He needs a tool to force the separation. Satan uses people to do his work for him. He doesn't have to drive the wedge. He merely creates the stump into which the wedge is driven. Looking again at Figure #1 the middle graphic, there is a wedge between the two persons. Rather than the bond of love, there is shown a lightning bolt. That's "friction".

"Friction" is two worlds colliding! The first graphic shows two worlds as well, but with a bond of love. Satan tempts (the stump into which the wedge is driven) and because there are two worlds, one or both persons hit the wedge often repeatedly! Wedges may be gossip, jealously, lust, theft, lies, or even physical wrongs. Wedges hurt people Either one or both gets hurt and the wedge is driven. Love no longer bonds and rather than friendship, individual person-hood results, each little god looking out for the "self". 

Satan wants us to be merely persons, not friends, He wants love dissolved from the bond and he gives the wedge for us to use on ourselves! When the unity of friendship is broken, the one become two. Love is gone. Sure indifference, even fake love (cordiality) remains, but love is gone and the person who drives the wedge is in darkness!

Sometimes Person #1 drives the wedge, but is sorrowful for driving it. God wants us to make things right again. Not just to get along, but to restore love and friendship.

Matthew 5:23 "Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; 24 Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift."

It doesn't matter who was wrong. The brother in Light reconciles with his brother. Sometimes we must admit wrong to be reconciled because the other person perceives wrong! That's humbling ourselves, or dismissing the pride which is kneeling to the altar of the god, the "self".

Associated with reconciliation is mutual forgiveness: for perceived wrong and actual wrong. Basically, for being Satan's tool in tempting a wedge to be driven.

Ephesians 4:32 "And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you."

Satan will ALWAYS be there to tempt. Wedges will always be driven. People ALWAYS somehow wrong us or we will have perceived wrongs. That's Satan "putting asunder what God has created"! He not only created marriage, but the institutions of love and friendship are his as well. The destruction of friendships is the divorce of love for one another in actuality. Just as marital divorce is Satan's working, the dissolution of friendships makes Satan smile at his own works! As long as God IS, friendships are salvageable. God WILL BE always and reconciliation is always possible... and God's will; nay his command!

In Figure #1 (lower graphic) what is it that breaks friendships and separates friends (see the ruler)? It's the ugly demon of "Hate"! "But", you say, "I don't hate him; I just don't love him!" We have already established that in God's eyes "lack of love" is akin to hate because we must love one another. The scale (ruler) between two people is actually a measurement of how far out of God's will the people are. It may be one or the other or both which creates the distance, but with separation, who is to gain? Satan! Person #1, Person #2 and God lose!

What can rid the graphic of distance between the two? Forgiveness and reconciliation. That's what God wants because to "love" there must be friendship, and as we have seen, love is the glue which bonds friendship. Saying "love thy neighbor" is the same as saying "befriend your neighbor". But God has one more requirement "love even your enemy".

Luke 6:35 But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.

 That's to be friends in spite of differences. The Civil War is an example of many people loving even their enemy. On slow days they would commune in friendship across enemy lines. Enemies can befriend enemies, but what's wrong when Christians can't be friends with Christians?

That wedge still separates. The scale holds them apart. The scale is lack of love and to love means to restore friendships.

Now look at what Tom Gaskins says in Figure #2:

Figure #2: No Love with Forgiveness

He forgave, but he failed to love! "Not hating" is "failure to love". Sure our emotions justify hating, but love is more than an emotion. It's a command of Jesus! Why should we feel righteous when we just fail to hate somebody? We should be ashamed because we're to love everybody, even our enemies, and merely being cordial is not the purveyance of love!

"I'll never get close enough for you to hurt me again" is trading the love of others to preserve your own god! You don't want your god hurt so you even disobey God's command to "love one another". Strangely, God knows how much you love your "self" and demands that you love others, even your enemies, as much as you do your "self"; your own "other god".

What is "forgiveness"? It's to cancel hard feelings. It's the removal of hate and the return of love! In Figure #1 it's yanking that scale which separates and allowing the two worlds to merge again. It's the restoration of love and it's that love which defines friendship!

Merely "forgiving" is as filthy rags in God's sight. Forgiving must be accompanied by love! John 3:16 speaks of God so loving the world. We are to love as well. God loved us even though we're sinners:

Romans 5:8 "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

Jesus loves us even as we sin against him! He's our friend. He's there whenever anyone turns to him, yet Christians can't truly forgive. What if Jesus forgave us our sins, but failed to love us? That would be a farce! Forgiveness without love is dead works. Mr. Gaskins is spreading false doctrine!  God is angered when we Christians fail to do the one thing he asks of us; to love one another!

Do you have resentment, lack of true forgiveness and hate (even apathy) on your heart right now? If so, you walk in darkness and you need a little Jesus in you! That's opening yourself back up to allow love to return. For the Holy Spirit to fill you, love must welcome him. All us Christians must be in one accord for the Holy Spirit to work within us. Just be friends! So easy, yet so hard because disdain is a tool of Satan, but love conquers all! Defeat Satan! Be joyful again to you who do not love and harbor ill-feelings in your heart.

Jesus forgives us just as if the sin never happened. His love is not taken away and returned because of our wrongs. His is steadfast love! Love isn't withheld based of damage to our little god, but in spite of how hurt our "self" becomes. It's God we are to worship. We are to sacrifice the "self". Forgiveness is the sacrifice we are to make in the spirit of love! Jesus is our friend because he loves us. Friends love one another! Hate is of the devil and so is "non-love".