Perfecting love casts out our fears

(Editor's note: New article today. Here is older piece:)

Paul testifies in Romans 1:14 that he’s “a debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians; both to the wise, and to the unwise.”

“That’s a debt to love he’s talking about,” explains Preacher Richard Jordan. “You know, love puts claims on your life that the law never could. Love is a motivator; it’s something that reaches into your heart and motivates you internally to do something that no external compulsion could do.

“You could write all the laws you want in the books of the City of Chicago that a mother must take care of her child and it won’t motivate them to take care of their child just to keep from getting the wrath of the law."

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“The greatest happiness in life is the conviction that we are loved, loved for ourselves, or rather loved in spite of ourselves,” writes Jo Petty in her 1962 bestseller, Apples of Gold.

“The door to the human heart can be opened only from the inside . . . Scientists know only what loves does. Love, properly applied, could virtually empty our asylums, our prisons, our hospitals. Love is the touchstone of psychiatric treatment.

"Love can be fostered, extended, used to subjugate hate and thus cure diseases. More and more clearly every day, out of biology, anthropology, sociology, history, economics, psychology, the plain common sense, the necessary mandate of survival—that we love our neighbors as ourselves—is being confirmed and reaffirmed. Christ gave us only one commandment—Love. Now to the laboratory with love!”

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“Always remember, our ambassadorship is INSIDE of us living out THROUGH us," says Jordan. "It can NEVER be carried on by our outward man.

“Because there isn’t any kingdom to bring in, God dumps all of this stuff on us upfront so right now we can get used to operating in it, working in it, living in it. We’re operating in His mind and thinking, so that when we get to heaven, we’ll be ready to get on with the program.

"I John 2:5 says,[5] But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him.

“Where obedience exists, it’s the completion and the perfection of love. Love reaches its completion, it’s filling up, by being obedient to the will of God.

“Love is never complete without obedience and it’s a verse like that, and a truth like that, that says, ‘See, that’s what we need today! We need to be obedient so we need to completely . . . ’ and you take that principal and apply it to us and pretty soon people go into I John . . .

“I know grace preachers that use I John and believe I John is the greatest impetus to Christian living there could ever be and the way they do it is the way the Baptist brothers do it and it’s that they go into the passage and pull out verses like this but take a blinder to the other verses and what the passages really say, and instead they conclude, ‘See, if you really love Him then you need to obey Him.’

“Now, is that a true statement? Well, it’s hard to argue with that. But this passage is saying a WHOLE lot more than that.

“By the way, you notice verse 5 says, ‘But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected’? It’s perfected by their obedience, by their keeping the commandments. They’re going to need some perfected love.

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“Look at I John 4: [17] Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.
[18] There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.
[19] We love him, because he first loved us.

“Tell me something. If you had perfect love, would it be a benefit for these people? It'd cast out fear. It gives them boldness in the day of judgment.

“When the persecutions come on them they understand how; they have a mental attitude of understanding that gives them the ability to sustain through the problems. But how did they get their love perfected?

“Their love is perfected by keeping His Word. Because they kept His Word they had a mature, complete love; an obedience that came out of that love that gave them the capacity, when the persecutions came, to endure through them without the fear, without the paralysis, or the phobia.

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“You know what the problem is with these verses in I John?They aren’t the way God deals with us. What are they? They represent performance-based acceptance. That’s another way to say ‘the law’; legalism.

“It's all about how you’re accepted and blessed and get the reward because you served. That’s performance-based acceptance. Performance motivation. Conditional blessings based upon your performance. That’s what the law is. We’re not under the law system, so you know what they won’t do? They won’t motivate you today.

“In the dispensation of grace, Paul says in Galatians 5:18, ‘[18] But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law. So if you try to use those verses in I John today, is that the Spirit of God working in you or something else?

“You see, you’ve got an objective standard in your Bible to tell you . . . boy, you never want to get very forgetful of Galatians 5:18. God the Holy Spirit never leads anyone to live under a performance-based system to gain acceptance before God, but your flesh sure will; religion sure will.

“What would the Spirit of God lead you to do? Live under grace. We perform not to get something but because of who we are, and how can we live any other way than consistent with who we are already?

“You see, we get it all dumped on us up-front. Israel had to wait until the end to get it out there. It has to do with the nature of the program with Israel and the nature of the program with us. Israel’s program is a literal, physical, visible earthly program where the blessings are the kingdom. For them, even eternal life is resurrection life in the kingdom. That’s their ultimate blessing and everything else they have is a foretaste of that.

“But you and I . . . you see, God isn’t in the real estate business today. He’s not reclaiming lands, houses and all of that. He’s forming a spiritual body of Believers. What happens to your flesh today—good, bad or indifferent—is not the issue today.

“Your ambassadorship is carried on in your inner man, in your new man. Your old man hasn’t even been saved yet. Your body is still of the earth, earthy. It won’t be redeemed until the Rapture.

“Now you tell me, if God works in my inner man and my outer man isn’t saved yet, which is the issue? See, that’s why all of the physical stuff isn’t really the issue.

"It’s the life that’s in us, and as that life in us lives out through our bodies of flesh, then the flesh gets to do something. Because it’s internally motivated by what God’s doing in our inner man.

  

“The way Planet Earth is set up to operate is on a performance basis. Go back to Genesis 3 and you see it. So is it any wonder that the reason God would deal this way with the nation of people who He’s ordained and established to reclaim the earth?

"How would you expect Him to expect them to operate? It’s on a performance basis because that’s the realm they’re going to operate in. You and I are going to operate in a different realm and that’s why we get a different kind of a system."