UNEXPECTED
LOVE By David Diestelkamp (continued
from THINK page 1)
Then, for us, He endured the pain and humiliation on the cross
for six hours, then He gave up His spirit into His Father's hands.
So, can there be any doubt? "God demonstrates His own love
toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for
us" (Rom. 5:8).
Now here is an interesting
twist to God's love story: "This is My commandment, that
you love one another as I have loved you" (Jn 15:12). In
other words, we are to do more than acknowledge and thankfully
benefit from God's love, we are to emulate it in our dealings
with others. We tend to be willing to do this until application
turns ugly and distasteful, it is actually at this point that
we have the opportunity to demonstrate true godliness, loving
like God loves.
If we find it more difficult
to love our brother than to love God it is because we are loving
like the world. In the words of Jesus: "But if you love
those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners
do the same" (Lk. 6:32). God loves us. In fact, He loved
us first (1 Jn. 4:19) and when we weren't loveable (Col. 1:21-22).
He forgives us, is good to us, blesses us, and promises us a
home with Him for eternity.
Loving someone like this doesn't
take much. But loving our brother is quite another matter. Our
brother isn't perfect. He doesn't always love us first, he doesn't
always forgive, do good, bless or fulfill his promises. In our
anger and disappointment we use his offenses not to love him,
while still claiming to love our good God. God says to us: "If
someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar
And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God
must love his brother also" (1 Jn. 4:20-21).
There is a very strong temptation
for us to try to excuse hatred based on what a person does. They
lied, they cheated, they stole. At times like this, words like
injustice, terrible loss, suffering pain and death ought to echo
in our ears.
Those are what we required
of the love of Jesus--He endured it and then said, "Love
one another as I have loved you" (Jn 15:12). We don't love
others this way as payback or even to try to change them, but
because it is what love is, it is what God is, and what we desire
to be as well.
"Love your enemies, do
good to those who hate you" (Lk. 6:27) must become more
real to us. Jesus was not just talking about some threatening
foreign nation or someone we simply fear. He commands us to love
those who actually touch our lives with pain and even violence.
They hate us, slander us, rob us, humiliate us, inflict emotional
and physical pain, and kill us--yet, like God, we are to respond
only in love.
When the application of love
becomes difficult, even ugly, we are tempted to excuse our hatred
by saying, "I'm only human." Of course, that's not
accurate, we are created in the image of God and therefore able
to understand and choose to imitate His characteristics. Often
saying, "I'm only human" is our way of really saying,
"I'm going to do what my carnal, human, side desires,"
or "I'm going to act like the world in this situation."
Jesus said that it would be
our love for each other that would tell the world that we are
His disciples (Jn. 13:35). Not simply loving the lovable, but
loving, forgiving and blessing, when the world would not, says
we are not of the world, but of God. Jesus said, "Love like
this" and then died for us. Refusal to do so, no matter
who it is or what they have done, is to not know God (1 Jn. 4:8)
DAVID DIESTELKAMP
940 N. Elmwood Drive, Aurora, Illinois 60506
Email: davdiestel@yahoo.com
Return to THINK page 1.
LOVE
FEASTS By Karl Diestelkamp (continued
from THINK page 1)
1. It could not be a common meal eaten in conjunction
with the Lord's supper, since the apostle Paul condemned such
as making it impossible to properly eat the Lord's supper.
2. It could not be a common meal with the church
providing either the food or the place for such a common meal,
since the apostle Paul told them to eat such meals at home and
in their own houses. Compare Acts 2:46: "And day by day,
continuing stedfastly with one accord in the temple, and breaking
bread at home, they took their food with gladness and singleness
of heart."
3. In Jude 12 (as well as 2 Pet. 2:13) the subject
is the brazen conduct of false teachers among the saints--"when
they feast with youwhile they feast with you." Thus it refers
to either while they are feasting in common meals in the homes
of brethren or it refers to "feasting" with the brethren
in something spiritual. And that, brethren, sounds like the Lord's
supper--what better describes the Lord's supper than a "feast
of love" or "love-feast?" At the very least this
is reasonable and logical.
Brethren who are looking to
"agape" and "the love-feast" for justification
for the church to provide the means and/or the place for social
gatherings and common meals are simply drowning men "grasping
for straws." The New Testament text does not authorize or
support such. Give such social practices back to the denominations
from whence they came, and do not call them "love-feasts."
If brethren want to gather
for social activities and eating together and want to also have
some spiritual things (singing hymns, etc.) along with those
activities, they will have to do that as individuals in their
own homes or in facilities borrowed or rented by individuals.
The church (the assembly of Christians--the collective body)
and its treasury cannot be involved unless there is scriptural
authority. Keep in mind that a meeting place, provided by the
church, is simply the church treasury (the Lord's money) at work.
The work of the church falls into one of only three categories:
1. Edification
(building up) of the body of Christ--this is spiritual activity.
2. Evangelism
(preaching the gospel to the lost)--this is spiritual activity.
3. Benevolence
to needy saints (relieving poor saints)--this is spiritual activity.
Anything that does not fit
into one of these categories, is not, and cannot be, the work
of the church. Eating common meals together and engaging in social
and recreational activities and providing the place for such
(including weddings and receptions) is not the work of the church.
Some brethren just need to
be honest and admit that they want social functions as part of
church activity and they are going to have them whether there
is scripture for them or not. If you have read Jude 12 in its
context, you know as much about the "love-feast" as
anyone else anywhere. Be sure you do not base your practice on
the assumptions of others, or on your own assumptions!
If there is biblical evidence
for social "love-feasts" I would be more than happy
to see it--but it must come from the Bible! I only want the truth
and to practice the truth and to do no harm at all.
KARL DIESTELKAMP
8311 - 27th Avenue, Kenosha, WI 53143
Email: kdiestel@execpc.com
Return to THINK page 1.
IRRECONCILABLE
DIFFERENCES By Andy Diestelkamp (continued
from THINK page 1)
This is the course that saints are admonished to take with one
another in their differences even when we are not married to
one another (Matt. 5:24; 18:15-17; Phil. 4:2,3). This becomes
all the more necessary when dealing with two saints who are married
to each other! Interminable separation is not the solution. Communication
is!
Despite Jesus' unambiguous
desire for unity among brethren and His uncompromising teaching
about the permanency of marriage, it seems that we tolerate an
awful lot of marital separation for causes other than fornication.
As if that were not bad enough,
when the spouse with less self-control finally stumbles, the
other imagines himself justified in divorcing and then marrying
another. Instead of being humbled by the reality that their sin
of defrauding one another and separating what God joined ultimately
led to fornication, there is joy because--in his imaginative
faith--the sin of fornication has provided him a scriptural escape
from an otherwise unwanted union. Woe unto you hypocrites! "Do
not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows,
that he will also reap. For he who sows to the flesh will of
the flesh reap corruption..." (Gal. 6:7,8).
Indeed, the world has made
a mockery of marriage, but so have many who claim Jesus as their
Lord. Brethren, when two people separate what God has joined,
it is time to take sides. Yes, the sisters may tend to side with
the wife while the brothers side with the husband. The fleshly
family of each will likely side with their kin. But what ought
to happen is that the saints side with their Lord and unite to
admonish their brother and sister to reconcile. It is an ugly
and messy business to wade into the cesspool of a toxic marriage,
but souls hang in the balance. Far too often we believe that
the solution is found in separation when what is needed is intervention
and confrontation aimed at repentance and reconciliation.
Paul did not suggest that Euodia
and Syntyche needed to separate and one of them start assembling
with the saints in Amphipolis or Neapolis. Therefore, I urge
you also, true companions, help those in troubled marriages to
be of the same mind, "having the same love, being of one
accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition
or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better
than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests,
but also for the interests of others" (Phil. 2:2-4).
The mind of Christ is not being
manifested in circumstances where the married have separated
from one another. Christ "humbled Himself and became obedient
to the point of death, even the death of the cross" (Phil.
2:8). Many spouses are unwilling to be that humble. They have
not been crucified with Christ, therefore the life that they
live in the flesh, they live for themselves and ignore the will
of the One who loves them and gave Himself for them.
Jesus died to reconcile us
to God. Irreconcilable differences? If the enmity created between
God and man could be reconciled through Jesus (Rom. 5:10; Eph.
2:16), then so can the enmity between spouses if both will humble
themselves and be obedient to the point of death. Let's stop
coddling carnal attitudes and actions regarding marriage and
start admonishing disciples of Christ to have the mind of Christ
in submitting to and loving one another (Eph. 5:22-33; 1 Pet.
3:1-7).
Return to THINK page 1.
ANDY DIESTELKAMP
323 E. Indiana Ave., Pontiac, Illinois 61764
Email: adiestel@verizon.net
SO,
YOU THINK YOU CAN DANCE? By Al Diestelkamp (continued from THINK
page 1)
Some who would not usually
dance with another man's wife or another woman's husband think
they can do so at a wedding reception. They are usually the same
people who will try to justify moderate drinking at such celebrations.
Oops! There I go again! I had better explain that when I refer
to drinking, I'm not talking about drinking Coke or Pepsi.
There are probably some who
are reading this that think dancing is no big deal. Through the
years I have found that it is usually women who have difficulty
seeing the danger. Many years ago when I was a teenager I remember
a gospel preacher named Bond Stocks who noted the same tendency
among women to defend dancing. In response, he issued a challenge
to such women to do the following:
1. Ask your husband, in private,
to level with you. Can he dance with another attractive woman
and not have sinful thoughts? He'll probably tell you, "No,
I can't."
2. However, if he tells you
that he can, take him to a police station and ask if they'll
give him a lie-detector test, because he's lying!
3. If he takes a lie-detector
test and passes it, take him to a doctor, because he needs one!
We men, if we are honest with
ourselves, know that dancing incites lust. As heads of our families
we have an obligation to say "No" to dancing even if
others in the family don't see the danger.
The Bible tells us that "each
one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.
Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin,
when it is full-grown, brings forth death." (Jas. 1:15).
Why in the world do Christians try to justify a practice that
places the spiritual lives of the participants in such peril?
AL DIESTELKAMP
P.O. Box 891, Cortland, Illinois 60112
Email: al@thinkonthesethings.com
Return to THINK page 1.
