We showed the video "Surrender to Love" featuring Gary Best, National Director for the Association of Vineyard Churches, at the beginning of services this past weekend, and his analogy comparing love to water really resonated with some people.
"Water... doesn't want to stay where it is... It's always searching around the edges to see if there's an escape route. Where does it want to get to? It wants to get to the lowest place and the farthest place."
How far will you let God's love take you?
(video from http://www.theworkofthepeople.com/)
While the video comparing love to water did have its point, it still left something to be desired. The issue the narrator, Gary Best, had with doctrine and learning is disturbing. What it leaves is a love un-tempered, dangerous indeed. While God is love, Love is not god. If it were as easy as love like water, God leaves the picture. We all love; sometimes we love the wrong things far too much. All love must not just be an unchecked torrent, rather one tempered by the will and grace of God. Any act or motive separate from the will of God would be sin, or so claims Paul in Romans. Can a sinful act have "good" results? Why would we as Christians engage in such sin? The will God isn't hidden from us, it is revealed in his word, the Bible. God does not want to hide such will or where he guides us and our love. He desires to channel it where it must go whether it is the lowest socially, economically, or most importantly spiritually. Doctrine is a part of this, not as some set of rules, rather a means by which we can catch a glimpse of God's will. Doctrine and love are like the wings of an airplane, remove either and the plane will not fly. Love might be like water, yet is this unchecked wild flow really what God desires?
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your thoughtful comments. While the video is certainly not the last word on the subject of love, I took the water image to be a depiction, first and foremost, of God's love, an image of how God's love flows (very deliberately) where He is needed. As we "go with the flow" of God's leading, we are able to experience new spiritual depths. I believe Gary was alluding to Ezekiel 47, which describes a river flowing down from the Temple of God's presence, growing deeper as it flows, refreshing every living creature. In showing the video, we were certainly not trying to promote license or denigrate doctrine, but rather suggest that people who follow God's lead in expressing love will be refreshed and renewed. God bless you!
ReplyDelete"...for active love is a harsh and fearful thing compared with love in dreams. Love in dreams thirsts for immediate action, quickly performed, and with everyone watching. Indeed, it will go as far as the giving of one's life, provided it does not take long but it is soon over, as on stage, and everyone is looking and praising. Whereas active love is labor and perseverance, and for some people, perhaps, a whole science. But I predict that even in that very moment when you see with horror that despite all your efforts, you not only have not come nearer to your goal but seem to have gotten farther from it, at that very moment - I predict this to you - you will suddenly reach your goal and clearly behold over you the wonder-working power of the Lord, who all the while has been loving you, and all the while has been mysteriously guiding you."
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