What Kind of Love?

After writing yesterday’s blog, Is Love Enough? someone challenged me to re-think this idea of reaching out to others in love in a way that is not offensive.  So this caused me to dig ever deeper into God’s Word and my own experience with God’s love to really try and understand what it means to love others in a right and meaningful way, and not in a way that would turn them off.

I had to look honestly at myself and ask myself, “Do I really love people with God’s love, or am I just simply doing good works because it’s the right thing to do?”  If it is just an expression of good works, but my heart is hard, can I really say that I am loving people with God’s love?  And what are people seeing in me anyway?  Do they see me (she’s a nice but very flawed religious person) or do they see the love of God in me and are drawn to Jesus and want to know Him?  If what I am doing is just simply good works, then how am I any different than countless others who do good works, but are spiritually lost without God?  In fact, in some religions, if you fail to do good works, they will tell you that you’ll never please God or make it into heaven.  Their salvation is based on good works and not on the finished work of Christ on the cross (He died on the cross taking away the sins of the whole world and declared us righteous if we believe in Him, repent and receive Him – I John 2:2).  

So in thinking about this, an interesting word came to my mind – the word “anointing.”  What does it mean to be anointed?  The dictionary describes it as rubbing oil or ointment on someone.  When I looked up the word “anointed” in the Bible (King James version), the word appeared 96 times (interesting), and the word “anointing” appeared 26 times and the word “anoint” 33 times.  Who was anointed?  Mainly priests and kings in the Old Testament.

Lev. 8 – Aaron was anointed as a high priest.

I Samuel 16 – David is anointed to be king of Israel.

Jesus’ was anointed.

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; Isaiah 61:1 (ibid Luke 4:18 in Jesus own words).

 In the New Testament people were anointed with oil for the purpose of physical healing (see James 5:14-15) and to bless someone (Mary anointing Jesus' feet – Mark 14:3-9).

I’d like to share a personal experience of what happened to me re: being anointed with oil.  When I was in Bible School, we were encouraged to seek the outpouring of the Holy Spirit so that we would receive the power of the Holy Spirit (with the evidence of speaking in an unknown language [tongues]).  Now we were taught implicitly that this is NOT the same as the indwelling of the Holy Spirit (which every believer has).  The outpouring is similar to the anointing which enables you and empowers you to minister to others and do battle against Satan with much greater supernatural power than you could do otherwise (similar to the anointing that the priests and kings received in the Old Testament).  For the full account of this “outpouring” experience, read Acts 2 and keep in mind that Jesus had instructed the disciples to wait for this gift (Luke 24:49).  Here was His promise found in Act 1:8:  But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.) 

Notice the word “upon” -- this is NOT the same as the indwelling which happens to all believers in Christ, but this is an experience where the Spirit comes “upon” you (like the anointing of oil).

Back to my experience in Bible School.  Now back then I was not by nature a very loving person.  I naturally loved my family and my friends and I liked people, but I can’t say I loved strangers.  It would take me a long time to even warm up to them and learn to trust them enough to even like them, let alone love them.  I was probably more afraid of people than anything, so I was a loner.  But one day all of that changed.  I was getting to know Jesus and He had already revealed His love to me (read my story in my book When Love is All There Is).  But I wanted to experience this “upon” relationship that others had experienced and they kept talking about according to Acts 2.  I was still afraid because I really didn’t know what would happen, if anything, so I threw caution to the wind, and asked a group of friends to pray over me to receive this “upon” experience.  Nothing happened until later that evening when I went for a walk alone and I was talking to the Lord and thanking Him and praising Him for all He had done for me.  As I was praising Him, suddenly I could feel His Spirit literally come upon me (like a warm pouring of oil) and I had an Acts 2 experience.  He was performing a miracle when I could feel my physical tongue loosen (as if a knot had been untied) and from the depths of my soul, I started speaking another language, a heavenly language.  Was I afraid?  Not a bit.  I was filled with a joy that I had never felt before.  I remember literally running back to the Bible School and telling the people who had prayed over me that I had experienced the “upon” relationship.  After I told everyone who rejoiced with me, I went to my dorm room and started to journal my experience.  Then I felt inspired to write a poem.  Well I had written lots of poems before, but nothing like this!  This one was anointed!  I read it over and over again because it was so encouraging and I shared it with many others!  I could never have written a poem like that before I had this experience!  All the praise went to Jesus because He was now participating with me (or was I participating with Him?) in the creation of my writing.  And so my life changed and my ministry (mostly a writing ministry) changed after that.

I want to say that this was not wholly an “emotional” experience.  This was a spiritual experience that deeply touched my emotions and every area of my life.  I was already committed to Jesus, but I wanted this special experience even though I was initially cautious, and Jesus surprised me and honored my request.  I’m so glad He did!  I have since talked to many other Bible-believing and professing Christians who have also had this same joyful experience.

Now I would never say to anyone that they had to have this experience in order to love people.  Love is a command regardless of our personal feelings or experiences (see Matt. 22:36-39).  But for me, my ministry changed and became much more “strategic” and power-packed.  I was no longer struggling along trying to do my ministry alone in a hit and miss fashion – I knew I was being led by the Holy Spirit and watching Him work in my life and the lives of others He put in my path.  And remember, that when God is at work, He will confirm what He is doing and saying in His Word, our ultimate authority.  We must never rely on our feelings!  And on the opposite side of the scale, we must be careful not to love people out of dead and dry “obligation” which becomes a form of misdirected good works (i.e.: do I really have to do this?). 

I love the fact that our God is a God of order.  Even the spiritual gifts must be administered in a state of order (see I Cor. 14:40 and read the entire chapter to see how spiritual gifts are to operate in the Church).  Also, I encourage you to read all of I Cor. 12 for a fascinating description of all the gifts of the Spirit and how they all work together.  Perhaps we’re not even aware that God hands out special gifts to us.  I believe we need to ask Him for these gifts and to reveal what our gifts are.  

A final word about loving people -- all it takes is each one of us talking to and perhaps befriending only one lost person that the Lord has laid on our heart.  Perhaps this one person is being primed to be the next Billy Graham and will reach thousands and even millions for the cause of Christ.  Or perhaps our one special lost person will receive Jesus and be spared from a hopeless eternity without Him.  What a triumph to see this happen!

Thank you once again for reading.  I pray you will be filled with God’s love and find your one special lost person that you can befriend today.