Radio Free Babylon put out a comic strip every Monday, Wednesday and Friday I look for it on its Facebook page and am rarely unmoved. Sometimes it’s not so much the strip as the comments that get to me.
This was yesterday’s strip. Man, what a can of worms, love ourselves? That’s completely unbiblical. We have to hate ourselves because we are sinners. But we have to love our neighbours because they are sinners in need of a Saviour… Erm…
Hmm, let’s just take a little look at this.
Jesus said: Love God, love your neighbour as yourself.
Jesus said: He didn’t come to condemn the World but that through Him the world might be saved.
Jesus said: I call you friends.
Jesus said: whom the Son sets free is free indeed.
I completely understand that we sin, we fail, we get things wrong but if we spend our time focusing on that instead of the redemption, the salvation, the sanctification and doing what we are commanded – which is LOVE – then what a waste.
Instead of bickering about what ‘love yourself’ means we’d make better use of our time shaking off the lies that restrict and constrict us and believing what God says about us.
Paul said:
4 But then something happened: God our Savior and His overpowering love and kindness for humankind entered our world; 5 He came to save us. It’s not that we earned it by doing good works or righteous deeds; He came because He is merciful. He brought us out of our old ways of living to a new beginning through the washing of regeneration; and He made us completely new through the Holy Spirit, 6 who was poured out in abundance through Jesus the Anointed, our Savior. 7 All of this happened so that through His grace we would be accepted into God’s covenant family and appointed to be His heirs, full of the hope that comes from knowing you have eternal life.
Titus 3:4-7
This means I can love myself because God loved me first. Not a pampering, pat-on-the-back, self-involved love but one that frees me from regrets (if I let my sins go to Him) and enables me to glow-in-the-darkness shine-like-the-stars love my neighbour and let them see just what an abundant life looks like!
It’s been a week where I keep seeing us spending time arguing about things we really agree on, time spent trying to make sure we are comfortable instead of reaching the lost and dying around us, time that is slipping through our fingers wasted and irretrievable.
That wasting of time is something I need to stop. Better to ‘waste time’ lingering in His presence and being changed into His image than searching for ways to prove I am right in fruitless arguments.
God loves me. He loved me first. I am a new creation, His workmanship, He has plans and purposes and He doesn’t make mistakes!
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