Unconditional VS Boundaries

I keep seeing posts about unconditional love. They ultimately end up qualifying it somehow. Effectively putting conditions on unconditional love ironically enough. Yet these same people often talk about boundaries, which are technically conditions we place on love too. My fear is that people are playing these notions off each other in a way that they become the recipients of all the benefits, but don’t have to reciprocate. True love should be symbiotic, not parasitic. 

This got me thinking about where this idea even comes from. It often gets painted as Biblical, but is it? I could only find one instance of the word unconditional in the Bible, but it had nothing to do with Love. (Numbers 3:9) It was also specific to the NASB translation. (I limited my search to more scholarly translations in this case) Of course, many of these scriptural concepts are presented abstractly, not systematically. So that in itself is not necessarily evidence of anything.

Grace is often seen as an example of unconditional love. Yet it is somewhat dependent upon repentance though. With that being said, repentance is not a three-strikes and your-out concept. The Israelites blew way past that just in their 40 years in the wilderness. Jesus set a very different bar with his 70x7 statement. (Matt. 18:22) So perhaps the confusion lies in application. The church in its humanness often seems to offer grace inconsistently. Freely offering it to some. Yet stingy with it for others. Not that the world is any better by their so-called standard.

Perhaps the truly operative word here is love itself. The world today often equates it with tolerance and acceptance. So much so we cannot separate who we are from what we do. Meaning if you love someone, you can’t correct or question them, because that would make it conditional. This is a notoriously short-sighted view that will lead to terrible consequences when people set boundaries around their self-destructive and abusive behaviors. Which they do. God would never allow himself to be that foolish with love, even if we do. That is why his love is associated more with discipline, than tolerance. (Hebrews 12:4-13) Yet acceptance applied to unconditional love is a prime example of the double standard that I alluded to. We often expect people to tolerate things from us, that we would never accept from anyone. Even Biblically speaking, no one is expected to tolerate infidelity after all. (Matthew 5:31,32) So in that since love should be conditional.

Which brings up another aspect. Want versus need. For example, many want to win the lottery. Yet statistics show most lottery winners are flat broke within 5 years of the last payment being received. This is a testament to how giving somebody something that they are not mature enough to handle can be a bad thing. Since what they wanted was not what they really needed. A truly loving person understands this and puts need before want, even if some call that conditional in their immaturity. Yet in our limited mortal nature, we often fail to discern this accurately. Often interjecting our comfort into the needs of others. There is also more to need than just basic physical ones. The tail end of 1st Corinthians 12 actually lifts up this notion of varying spiritual needs. Instead of a one-size-fits-all application as people tend to favor. Especially if they are the standard. 

This highlights another subtle Biblical point that most have overlooked. Yet may be the answer we truly need. 1st Corinthians 12 through 14 are all part of the same broader passage. To lump the 13th “love” chapter in with spiritual gifts implies something. To truly love in a Godly way, we must do so in the spirit, not the flesh. When you get down to it, all these unrealistic notions about unconditional love, boundaries, and the double standards associated with them likely all occur because we try to love with the sinful nature of the flesh instead. Only the Spirit can navigate us through this complex notion without becoming self-serving in application. So if the church universal is seen as unloving. It is either devoid of spirit or being looked at merely through the lens of the flesh. It has become quite apparent that the world around us is doing just that, rather unapologetically too. All the more reason to not love as they do.

Let’s face it, we live in a world that wants to take love, rather than give love. This one detail ultimately turns something beautiful, into something ugly. With that being said, I would like to propose eliminating the phrase “unconditional love” from our vernacular. It’s just too misleading and unrealistic. It is not the ultimate standard that the world would have you believe.  I propose we embrace “agape love” instead. With the understanding that it is dependent upon the Holy Spirit to truly fulfill.

The Visual PARABLEist

Community of Factions

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. -Galatians 5:19-21

Ever read or possibly watched the movie based on the book Divergent. It’s a dystopian tale about a society broken into factions. These factions revolved around what each group believed was the ultimate answer to the world’s ills. Which happened to be where their individual natural talents lie. Other factions are often seen as a problem getting in the way of their one-size-fits-all brand of progress. Is this not a reflection of the church universal right now? Broken up into doctrinal factions. This is yet another example of the church following human nature instead of the Holy Spirit. Where we only want to emphasize what we are comfortable with, so we never have to challenge ourselves.

Worship/Love. Churches that center on worship tend to be about provoking feelings. They just want to help the people get happy. As if a whitewash of happiness truly transforms the heart, or honors God. A close cousin to that is love. However, love-centered churches tend to reduce the concept to mere superficial feelings as the world does. So both, if not the same church, effectively turn emotions into an idol. Yet they fail to recognize that the word emotion never appears in the Bible, not once. All because their actual understanding of the Bible is so very shallow.

Outreach. Churches that get overly fixated on evangelism and missions tend to be about recruiting recruiters for the sake of numbers. Yet once they get people in the door, what do they have to offer them but an expectation to recruit. Such churches always run into the same wall. A tepid response to the call of outreach. Some people just don’t have those particular sets of gifts, so they get treated as second-class. Even those who do are sometimes too broken to jump head-first into the mission right away. Since they’ve never been taught wholeness, or anything else not outreach-related. So these churches often just end up fueling people's feelings of inadequacy, instead of walking them through the healing they need to embrace their purpose. Which may, in fact, be outreach, or possibly preparing and equipping people for their purpose. Equipping is a stepping step some such churches like to jump over, only to fall on their face. (Eph. 4:11-13)

Obedience. Much like the Pharisees, such churches are mostly about defining righteousness and expecting people to live it, without actually getting involved. Yet they never address the ultimate cause of the bitter fruit of sin. Which always takes root in the heart. Those who don’t get driven away by shame, just end up faking it. Since they have never been taught wholeness of heart either. Does not Romans 2:4 say it’s God’s kindness that leads us to repentance? So why does this faction only want the emulate his wrath?

While this is far from an exhaustive list, it covers the most common ones I have observed. The irony of it all is that they are constantly pointing fingers at one another saying their gospel is incomplete. Yet they are all correct in saying so. If only they understood that the Holy Spirit would show how all these seemingly incompatible elements actually are dependent on one another.

Factions are listed as acts of the sinful nature of the flesh for a reason. Yet nobody wants to talk about it the same way as all the others. A subtle admission of guilt perhaps. A truly righteous church that follows the Spirit won’t be adding to this particular problem in the body of Christ. Yet those who do are clearly not following the will of God, only their own. Granted, people are frequently in different stages of their spiritual journey. So we are never going to all agree, all the time. However, if we’re continuing to follow the spirit, learn, and mature throughout our lives; shouldn’t the denominations be balancing out?

I know a guy who says “We practice Christianity, not church-inanity. This means our institutional bias’ has a way of shifting our focus away from what the institution was meant to stand for, in favor of the man-made institution itself. So we never question their particular outlook on any detail.

When King David was within the will of God, he was unstoppable. But when he wasn’t, his kingdom started to fall apart. It is no different for us, we could be a force to be reckoned with. Yet until we consider that we may not understand as well as we think and own the faults within the institution, that won’t come to pass.

The Visual PARABLEist

Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. -Ephesians 4:15

Spiritual Community

I was looking up passages about community, because let’s face it, it’s considered a vital part of what the church is. Yet it seems to be a place where the current church often struggles these days. Hence the desire to seek wisdom in correcting perceived problems. Certainly, there must be more to it than just throwing a bunch of people together and expecting it to emerge organically as we typically do. While that may be adequate for some personalities. Not so much for other more aloof temperaments. As of now, I have not found any passages on how to cultivate community via some forgotten systematic formula. However, there are a few models given to show us what a church community should look like. (Eph. 4, 1st Cor. 12) Within these examples, there is a shared detail that grants us some practical direction on how to actually fulfill said examples. That being the Holy Spirit. To make these models work, we must follow the Holy Spirit to escape the trappings of pride and self that plague communities. Since the current-day church does not actually resemble either of these models at all, one can only conclude we are following human nature more than the Spirit. So it’s no wonder church communities are often dysfunctional. 

Consider this, according to psychologists, the desire for community is so strong with humanity, that we will try to build a community around just about anything. Including toxic things that only encourage self-destructive behavior. For example, street gangs. Technically a community, but that in itself does not make them beneficial. This should stress why we need more than human will to guide our church communities. Therein lies our first obstacle. Most current churches only give the Holy Spirit lip service at best. Others outright denounce the Holy Spirit, saying the only relevant authority of God's will today is the Bible. There are a few problems with this questionable argument though. 

    1. The statement itself violates the very scripture they profess. (1st Thes. 5:19)
    2. While the Bible can give commands and define righteousness we often need help in application. In the time of Christ, Jesus was constantly correcting the religious authorities in the application of scripture, and questioning their sincerity and motives. Naturally, we still need something more for the specific details of living it out correctly. Christ called the Spirit the Helper (or Advocate depending on the translation) for a reason. (John 14:16 & 15:26)
    3. The Bible can tell us that we are Set Apart for a purpose. But we need the Spirit to lead us to what our specific purpose is. It’s no wonder everyone tells me “I don’t know what my purpose is.”They are asking ministers and teachers, not the Spirit.
    4. The Bible can define sin. Only the spirit can reveal what the specific root of it in you is. Or what you specifically need to address to overcome it. The oversimplified whitewash-like advice of “stop it” has only led to frustration and repeated backsliding. The spirit can also give us the strength to face our wounds and resist, so we can actually live by said definitions. (Eph. 3:16)
    5. While some argue the Holy Spirit was only relevant in the apostolic age, let me refer you back to John 14:16 where Jesus says the the spirit would be with us FOREVER. Legalists even try to put a time limit on “blasphemy of the Spirit.” Even though there is no reference to time at all in the applicable passages. (Matt. 12:31-32, Mark 3:28-30, Luke 12:8-10) Some may use this made-up excuse to rationalize their blatant blasphemy. For others, it may be more about arrogance. They assume that if miraculous things still happened today they would be the first to experience it. They would rather change the script than admit they are not nearly as Holy as they assume.

“. . . The Helper can never be packaged or programmed to fit any man-devised plan. . . “ -Catherine Marshall, The Helper

Here in lies many people's issues with the Holy Spirit, our human nature likes our systematic and predictable formulas. As well as our ability to control the narrative and outcome. If we deny the Spirit, we think He can’t get in the way of our less-than-divine plans.

Granted we will always need the Bible as a litmus test, to remind us of our ultimate goals in the Christian walk. So as not to confuse our own emotions with the Spirit. Or possibly an unclean spirit that would deceive us. In short, the Bible tells us where we need to go, but the Spirit tells us how to get there. But even the Bible will do you no good if you rely on blasphemers of the Spirit with ulterior motives to explain it to you.

The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” -John 3:8