Take the obedience VS love debate within the church. Many are under the impression that they are mutually exclusive concepts, and that one side needs to be uplifted more than the other. This is completely wrong no matter which side you favor. So it's no wonder that both sides are failing miserably at genuine holiness. As I've already indicated before, you can't succeed at the obedience-righteousness side of holiness without wholeness since our brokenness tends to drive our sinful nature. Nor can you lead people down the path of wholeness without loving them. So you can't separate or uplift one higher than the other without maligning the image of God and failing to produce strong disciples.
Another thing we need to keep in mind in serving with both love and obedience is that people have a hard time separating the person from their actions. In the world's mind, to love someone is to accept everything they do, including every imperfection, sin, crime, and selfish act. The other side of it being, we feel obliged to hate everyone who we see as unrighteous. How do you seek and save the lost if we are hating on them? Yet, if we are only making excuses for the sins of the lost, we aren't really saving them either. It's a very human way of doing things, and it fails in the same way from either extreme. So one-dimensional application just doesn't lead to the righteous life God desires. The people of Jesus' time struggled with this as well. There was a reason Jesus called them whitewashed tombs, it's about as good as you can hope for when only applying selected dimensions of holiness, a phony surface faith. (Matthew 23:27-28) Two thousand years later we still struggle to set ourselves apart from our natural instincts so we can embrace the divine nature that is three-dimensional holiness. (2nd Peter 1:3-4)
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. -Matthew 5:43-48
But let's not forget the third dimension of holiness, set apart. I bring it up because our notion of love is becoming more saturated with acceptance, and validation from the world continually, not being set apart from it. Which makes their version of love more about gratifying our emotion that is ultimately about self, not God's will. This often leads to parasitic behavior and toxic relationships. Not to mention it makes us vulnerable to manipulative people who are willing to exploit our desire for approval for their own gain. That only creates more brokenness and unrighteousness. No wonder true Biblical Agape love is not defined that way. So neglecting this notion of being set apart, can do great harm to a church's spiritual formation. Just remember, looking at the concept of being set apart alone may seem like holiness makes you superior, and lead you to act arrogantly. However, if we look at it along with its other parts of wholeness and righteousness, then we realize holiness needs to be tempered with humility. A superiority complex is a product of a broken unrighteous person, not a whole righteous one after all.
The church has gone wrong and mishandled so many key issues over the years. It all comes back to not understanding and applying holiness completely, which means we don't really understand God properly. The church needs to step up and seek the face of God, and ultimately his holiness more deliberately, instead of relying on common yet incomplete knowledge, and mere feelings that have led to all this misapplication. This has only benefited the secular world's attempts to redefine right and wrong in self-centered terms. This technically makes those who follow an incomplete definition of holiness guilty of leading people astray. Don't be that person. (Matthew 18:6-7)
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