RULES FOR LOVING -- Devotional for June 13, from "Good Seeds"

If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. (Luke 14:26)

This is one of the more difficult to understand verses in the Bible. But just like the most precious diamonds come from the deepest mines, so the truth contained in this passage is a gem of greatest value to the soul. However, in order to extract that truth, we must employ some pretty specialized tools, for Jesus is using a way of speaking which requires more than an elementary level of comprehension. “When the literal sense makes sense,” says one of the rules of biblical interpretation, “seek no other sense.” We apply that rule to Christ’s otherwise shocking statement in John 6:54, “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life.” If we take this statement literally, as did some of Christ’s hearers that day, we, like they, would take great offense at what He said (or maybe we’d build a false theology around it!) Either way we’d be missing the big picture, which is simply that Jesus is making His case for commitment: “There’s no room in My kingdom for a casual faith; nor is there room for those who’ve not yet decided just who their god will be.” In the John passage Jesus is not talking about cannibalism, but rather identification. He is saying that just as physically we are what we eat, so in matters of the soul we become what we feed upon. As we hear His Word and obey it, we begin to be identified with the very character of Christ. Discipleship, then, is not a matter of taking on new information, but rather becoming a totally new creation. How does this happen? Well, it starts by a simple act of faith, as we receive Christ as our Lord and Savior. But then it continues through the gradual process of training into Christlikeness. Jesus said it this way, “A pupil is not above his teacher, but everyone, after he is fully trained, will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40). In the same way, in the Luke passage Jesus is not telling us to literally hate our loved ones – indeed He took the question of love for humanity to the highest pinnacle when He commanded us to love even our enemies! But He is impressing upon us that loving man and loving God are two entirely different things – they’re not even in the same ballpark, or on the same planet! How could we possibly think loving our loved ones could qualify us as lovers of God? This is the argument of today’s benevolent humanist (atheist) who preaches a gospel of love, but says God has no part in it – in fact, He just gets in the way. Hmmm! What does the Bible say about this? “Only a fool would say in his heart that there is no God” (Psalm 14:1). And yet, when love for God is our highest priority, love for humanity spills all over everyone around us, friend or foe.