LOVE AND HOLINESS

God is love and God is also holy. I shared how love without holiness leads to compromise and holiness without love leads to legalism and harshness. Both are ugly and one without the other leads us to a ditch on either side. Over the last few decades, the church has talked about the love of God without talking about Holiness. But we as believers and Christs church both insist that truth demands also loving confrontation. There are 3 possible positions according to Francis S Schaeffer. 1Unloving confrontation. 2 non confrontation 3 Loving confrontation. I want to suggest because we don’t want to be labelled as unloving, so we tend to not confront at all or we avoid it like the plague. We New Zealanders are fairly laid back anyway as a culture and so we tend not to want to rock the boat so we remain silent and we compromise Gods word and don’t speak the truth when we need to when something is wrong. That’s why the church has tended to compromise especially when it comes to Gods moral standards. But only the 3rd position is truly biblical.

The chasm is not conforming to the spirit of the world in this age. and the obedience to Gods word. And this means living in obedience to the fully inerrant authority of God’s word in the crucial moral and social issues of our culture today. Yes, there must be a balance and holiness standing together in love. Is that Easy. Not at all. It will cost you to stand but too not stand will cost you more in the end. Lines will have to be drawn. It takes courage and Gods wisdom. Compromise is not an option.