I've often heard it said and even used to say myself that we should befriend unbelievers in order to win them to Christ. That seems like it would be a noble reason to love people, doesn’t it? So that we can win them to Christ. But the truth is, that’s not a good reason for loving or befriending people. We befriend people, we love people because that’s our nature. It's who we are. To befriend a person who’s not a Christian and to love that person simply for the purpose of leading them to faith in Jesus Christ means that you have developed a relationship with them with an ulterior motive. Don’t misunderstand, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to see people come to trust Christ, but we are to love people and befriend them, not for a hidden agenda, but because Christ lives in us, and he simply loves people. He loves them if they are believers or if they aren’t believers. In fact, he loves them even if they are never going to become believers.
There’s a story in the New Testament, in Mark, where Jesus met a rich young ruler. He came to him and said “What do I need to do to inherit eternal life, good master?” And Jesus says: “Well, what you need to do is to sell everything that you have, and give it to the poor.” The reason that he told him that, was because this guy thought he was a great keeper of the law, and Jesus said ‘let’s raise the bar and let the law reveal your sin’, which that’s what law does. And the man was unwilling to do that, he went away very sad, but there’s an interesting verse in Mark 10:21 that reveals the heart of Jesus. “Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him”.
Now here’s an important question: Do you think Jesus knew from the beginning that that man was not going to turn to him and follow him? Of course he did. And yet with that full knowledge of how this man was going to respond, the Bible says Jesus looked at him and felt love for him.
Let’s just love people. The truth is, if you befriend somebody just for the purpose of bringing them to Christ, people sense when there’s an ulterior motive. They tend to know when we have an underlying hidden agenda that we’re not telling them. So let’s lay that aside, and let’s just love others because Christ is in us, and God is love, and it’s our nature to love, and when we love them the way that He does - unconditionally, then, don’t be surprised, if you don’t find these unbelievers being attracted to the Christ in you, and wanting you to give them more information about what it means to follow Him. And ultimately they’ll come to know the Lord anyway.
But the idea that we need to befriend unbelievers in order to win them to Christ is deceptive and far removed from Agape. We befriend unbelievers and love them because we can do no less, because Christ is our life, he loves them, so we love them too.
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Steve, why do you ALWAYS seem to say exactly what is on my heart and I so ineptly try to express? I wish we could write a book together someday...you are so profound. I never can seem to get my writing done.
ReplyDeleteI feel like most of my life I have known what you are saying, and I agree. The sad part about it is that I have not enjoyed life very much because of it. I have been opposed by so many for so long in looking for their approval of the way I believe, causing me to second guess myself and continue to be miserable.
ReplyDeleteI always felt funny about befriending others to basically trick them into coming to church so the pastor can save their souls. At the time of my youth, there was something so fresh and so pure in the way that I viewed unbelievers. I was real, and I needed no coaching as to how to "love" my neighbor. I did love my neighbo , and it was so amazing! But after a while I fell into a stupor and forgot just how powerful the love of God really was.
I feel that every situation in one's life always points to a crisis, one of identity. If you don't know who you are , you're cooked. As a Christian you will then experience unbelief and suffer a self condemning outcome.
Why oh why do we make this life so hard to live when the truth is so sweet to our ears?
What you have written happened to me! You just told my story. I cannot agree enough with this post. Love people and befriend them regardless...they will be drawn to the peace and hope you exhibit and ask for more...I was the one drawn to a friend of many years...and even though she never pushed me or even brought up her faith..it was that fact that ultimately drew me in. However the person who tried to 'save' me actually scared me away.
ReplyDeleteOuch for the freindship evangelism program. Love is no respecter of persons it cannot see their sin it can only see them as God sees them. To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. (2Co 5:19)
ReplyDeleteWhat a thought provoking post! Is Christ's love our compelling motivation or a sense of "this is the right thing to do"?
ReplyDeleteTo often we might be doing "good things" for religious reasons rather than walking by the Spirit.
Joseph Prince challenged my thinking by saying once that we might have felt is was the "right and good" thing to help the prodigal whilst he was in the pigpen. Yet, how would he have reached the end of himself then? It is more important to be led by the Spirit regardless of sometimes how it looks...good or evil.
Jesus didn't look so "good" to those who were judging by religious standards quite often.
Thank goodness we can be Ministers of Reconciliation not Rehabilitation!!! :D
We need to agape but without involving ourselves in sin. Jesus ministered loving personhood and some awesome words before He would heal and do miracles! He asked them what they wanted! He just didn't shove down their throat nor be a busybody and when He did what He saw His Father doing things began to happen! Hint Like we should.
ReplyDeleteExcellent message, thank you for posting this, Steve.
ReplyDeleteJesus never said we would not have enemies. He never told us we had to pretend to have no enemies. He simply taught us that to be like Him, we are to love them, just as we love our friends. It sounds on the surface like a contradiction in terms, but it is not. An enemy is someone who opposes you, someone who makes you hurt, someone who clearly does not have your best interest in mind. Large scale or small, an enemy undermines you, gossips about you, slanders you, misrepresents you, dogs your steps, tries to trip you up, tries to get you to stumble, and laughs at you when they succeed, and points at you and makes a loud noise about how your ability to be provoked or your ability to be made to stumble somehow "proves" you are not a real Christian, or not a person of integrity, or whatever. In reality it only proves you are very much a person, period -- very human like everyone else. And that's all.
Our natural response to enemies is to fight back, try to dominate, try to do it to them before they get a chance to get one over on us. It is this that Christ tells us to refrain from, this that He seeks to correct when He teaches us to love them so that we may demonstrate ourselves truly children of the Heavenly Father as Christ Himself is. But He never suggests that enemies don't exist or that we are to fool ourselves or others about their place in our lives, pretending them to be something else.
Very True MCW
ReplyDeleteThrough God's spirit and Jesus Christ we should have one mind and one purpose. Amen.
ReplyDelete