Who Do You Belong To, Part Trois, Supplemental

THIS POST IS NOT “THE DETAILS.” Like, Okay?

What I am posting here is something for you to pray and meditate on. Something vitally important for you to figure out, if you can.

There will be a test - eventually - on this material and more but (!) it definitely won’t be a written test and it won’t be on all my material and I won’t be giving it, so don’t sweat it girlfriend! It’s only your soul.

Just sayin’.

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As I said in Who Do You Belong To? Part Trois, being a slave is hard, thankless work. Being a faithful slave, even harder.

And IF we belong to Christ, we really belong to Him. We are His slaves among many other things.  

So, in Matthew 11:28-30, where Jesus says this:

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy-laden and overburdened, and I will cause you to rest. [I will ease and relieve and refresh your souls.] Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle (meek) and humble (lowly) in heart, and you will find rest (relief and ease and refreshment and recreation and blessed quiet) for your souls. For My yoke is wholesome (useful, good - not harsh, hard, sharp or pressing, but comfortable, gracious, pleasant), and My burden is light and easy to be borne. - The Amplified Version, AMP

This sounds not only good but fairly easy, right? How can being a slave to God, a disciple of Jesus, be hard, be thankless - be even harder?

Jesus did say there was a cost in following Him (Luke 14:25-34 - check out this article on what it means to “count the cost” at http://www.gotquestions.org/count-the-cost.html) and you would be right, after reading the fine print, as it were, to say, “Wow, that’s like harsh. Dude.” But the cost does not contradict His call to us who are seeking rest for our souls (Matthew 11:28-30).

But, as I said in Part Trois, the devil is in the details; the paradox of why it is both extremely hard and extraordinarily easy to be a slave of God, a slave to righteousness, a disciple of Christ.  

A key or clue for possibly understanding the details before I write them is this:

What is LOVE and in the words of Tina Turner, What’s Love got to do with it? (It being the whole being a slave/disciple bit.)

It’s sad, perhaps tragically so, that in every wedding I’ve officiated I’ve read I Corinthians 13 to the wedding party and their guests but I never truly understood its importance. I mean, hey, it’s in the all the ministerial manuals, all the liturgical manuals. It’s a thing. You do it.

It likely means absolutely zip to the couple getting hitched, anyone in the immediate wedding party or any of their guests. It’s just, like, you know, a thing that the guy saying all the words says before we get to the important bit: “...By the authority vested in me....I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride.” (This is important to most everyone in attendance because it signals that the wedding is almost done (Finally!) and the reception - the eating, drinking and making merry - will be getting underway shortly.)

But in I Corinthians 13 the Holy Spirit through Paul is very finely defining what LOVE is; its attitudes, characteristics, expectations, its actions.

Let me disabuse of something right now. LOVE in the context of discipleship to Jesus has is most definitely NOT an emotion. It doesn’t preclude emotion but it is most definitely NOT a singular emotion. Look at it as a skill set.

The Greeks were really, really, really, really...painstakingly precise in their use of their language. We have one word for “love” (love) which covers everything from marital love to parental love to brotherly love to puppy love to young love to erotic love.

The Greeks have three: Agape, Phileo & Eros.

It is Agape that the Holy Spirit is concerned with in I Corinthians 13. It is the the verb form of the word that Jesus uses in Matthew 22:37,39 (The Greatest Commandment* - Deuteronomy 6:4-5 - and “Next Greatest” Commandment - Leviticus 19:18).  And it is these two commands that Jesus declares in Matthew 22:40 as the foundation for all the Law and the Prophets.

* I think it would be well worth your time, if you’re surfing and not really getting any work done anyway, to google the word Shema and read about it. You may want to memorize it, recite it once or twice a day. Wouldn’t hurt anything but then what do I know. Oy! And maybe, just maybe, it would help you in understanding both the will of the Father and what being a disciple of Jesus is all about. It’s one of the central prayers of Judaism. It starts out: Hear, O Israel!… If you want to read it out loud, say the words reverently. Seriously.)

The Holy Spirit through Paul says in Galatians 5:6: ...the only thing that matters is Faith expressing itself through LOVE. (NIV)

Putting Galatians 5:6 in context for you:

For we, [not relying on the Law but] through the [Holy] Spirit’s [help], by faith anticipate and wait for the blessing and good for which our righteousness and right standing with God [our conformity to His will in purpose, thought and action causes us] to hope.

For [if we are] in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith activated and energized and expressed and working through love

• Galatians 5:5-6 (AMP)

So?

LOVE sounds rather massively important in the following of Jesus, our Lord; in the fulfilling of the two greatest commandments of God. As in, we can’t have just a warm and fuzzy feeling about it. It is NOT (mostly definitely NOT) an emotion.

So, what is LOVE and what’s it got to do with being a disciple?

Well, that is your assignment.

Figure it out. For yourself.

You may want to be sitting when you do figure it out because it will be a kick in the head, if not the gut and the gluteus maximus. As the late Justin Wilson (of Cajun and PBS Louisiana Cookin’ fame) used to say, I gar-on-tee!

I have been so stupid. I mean really, really, really, massively stupid (which probably doesn’t surprise some of you) in failing to recognize the vital importance of I Corinthians 13 in the grand scheme of things.

I shall henceforth repent of my ignorance. How ‘bout you? I mean, like, if you need to. Repent. Of anything. Ignorance, your world view/frame of reference, etc.

Well, until next time, I woke up with a snake tattoo. No. Not really.

May the Peace of Christ be with you,

†Scott, V.D.M., ev

“Scripture quotations taken (except as noted) from the Amplified® Bible, Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission." (www.lockman.org)  

Sections from the Amplified® Bible in this document are identified by “AMP” preceding or following the quotation or verse reference quoted - JSZ