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Chariot March 2008 - Norm Wakefield

The Curse of the Standard Bearers - Part 5

In this issue of the Chariot of Fire, you'll discover the following things:

•         An error of the Standard Bearers: Faith and love are equal
•         Loving God and keeping His commandments are not the same
•         What commandments are not burdensome?
•         How do you know you love people?
•         Why do born-again people not find loving people burdensome?
•         The birth of a Standard Bearer
•         The birth of a True Image Bearer
•         Your understanding of the new birth and the difference between
faith and love is significant

One of the wonderful benefits of knowing God and His Son, Jesus Christ, is the freedom that comes to love others. Last month we considered the freedom of the True Image Bearer that comes from his relationship with the Holy Spirit, whose lordship he jealously guards. If this is the first article in this series you've read, I encourage you to read all of them. You can find them at www.spiritofelijah.com/chariot, and I invite you to subscribe to the email list for future Chariots.

How does the new birth, faith, love, and obedience relate to this topic? I've been watching a series of sermons by Dr. John Piper, author and pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, MN. As I watched his message of March 2, 2008, I couldn't help but think about the Curse of the Standard Bearers series. I hope you'll be enlightened as I share some of what I heard and learned from Piper's sermon and relate it to being a True Image Bearer.

An error of the Standard Bearers: Faith and love are equal

One's understanding of the new birth is important. Seemingly small errant notions can result in great destruction. What is your thinking when you read 1 John 5:3?

"For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome."

If you're not careful, you may get a wrong notion from this verse. The destructive line of thinking goes like this: Love of God means the same as obedience. Obedience is the same as faithfulness. So that means I show my love by my faithful obedience to what I think God commands of me. And that love is the same as having faith. Therefore, faith and love are the same, just two sides of the same coin. Piper passionately says this kind of thinking is "deadly." It destroys love!

Loving God and keeping His commandments are not the same

Why aren't they the same? Because the Apostle John added, "and His commandments are not burdensome." Loving God means having a heart that doesn't find the commandments of God burdensome. The new birth puts within the heart of a person a deep longing and delight to keep His commandments. Therefore, we can make this key conclusion: Loving God leads to obedience.

Here's where the Standard Bearer may fall into another error. He will say, "That's right! If people really love God they will obey Him." No problem there, but it's how he defines "commandments" that leads him down the wrong trail. Without realizing it, he may define commandments as the same standards he thinks are godly, because he's sure he has interpreted the scriptures correctly. So to prevent this mistake, we need to ask this question:

What commandments are not burdensome?

If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.

As we read 1 John 4:20-21 we get a clear answer to this question. The commandments the apostle had in mind are this: Loving God and loving others. Hopefully we understand that those two commandments could now also be stated this way as one commandment. Loving God means we love others, especially other believers. 1 John 5:1 confirms this understanding. "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and whoever loves the Father loves the child born of Him."

We must be careful not to define commandments as a concise set of standards on issues. Responsible interpretation enables us to now make a second, more precise conclusion about what John meant when he wrote that loving God leads to obedience: Loving God leads to loving people. Now we need to ask another question.

How do you know you love people?

It's almost natural to think the answer is this: you love a person when he/she feels loved or when you feel or think you are doing something for their good–another deadly mistake. Although in some cases Spirit-led loving may feel good to the recipient, it isn't universally true. 1 John 5:2 tells how to know if you are loving a person.

By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments (1 John 5:2).

The simple truth is this: you know you love people when you love God and love others. Piper points out that John didn't say we love people when we do anything we feel or think is loving. He says that God is not impressed when we do what we think is love. He adds that we could be distracting them from their greatest need–to be born again so they can believe in Jesus Christ–by what we think is our idea of blessing them. So when we do something to bless others and don't lead them to find their all in Christ, it may curse them rather than help them. How many children sit in churches, homeschools, Christian schools, and attend conferences where they learn how to be "good Christians," but are deceived and asleep to their greatest need: to be born again so they can love God and thus others? If we don't help others see that their greatest need every moment of their lives is Jesus Christ, then we're not loving them. So this is another way of saying what I wrote in the last Chariot. We want their lives to be an expression of their relationship with the Holy Spirit as Lord.

What distinguishes the Standard Bearer from the True Image Bearer is that the True Image Bearer delights in loving his or her children (or anyone) by loving God and helping them see the reason to do everything is that it rises from an inward unction to love God and others. This only occurs when faith is planted in the heart through the new birth. Now we are positioned to see how the new birth influences one's ability to genuinely love with power and that faith and love must be kept distinct.

Why do born-again people not find loving people burdensome?

Here's the Apostle John's answer. People who love God and others have overcome the world!

"For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith (5:4)."

What is it about the world that has to be conquered that hinders someone from loving God and people with freedom and joy? Jesus' beloved disciple answered these questions clearly in 2:15-16.

Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.

Here's the bottom line from these verses as they relate to the new birth and the previous verses: only the new birth sets a person free from the desires and values of the world to love God and love people for the glory of God. What does this have to do with the Standard Bearer and True Image Bearer?

The birth of a Standard Bearer

Here's the most common way a Standard Bearer is born. He hears something like the following so-called "gospel" presentation. He is a sinner and the wages of sin is death. But God loves him so much that He sent His only Son, Jesus, to die on the cross as his substitute. He is encouraged to confess that he is a sinner and of his own free will believe and obey the gospel by accepting Jesus. This is usually done by inviting Jesus into his heart so he can be forgiven, avoid eternal punishment in hell, and instead go to heaven when he dies. He may be led to repeat or read a prayer of invitation.

Since he cannot deny the historical facts and sees the simplicity of praying such a prayer, it seems reasonable to do so for one or more of the following reasons.

•         He may feel guilty about specific things and praying feels like a good and right thing to do.
•         He may consider himself a good person, and accepting Jesus is consistent with goodness.
•         He may want the acceptance of his pastor, Sunday School teacher, parent, or evangelist.
•         He may want the praise and approval of his parents.
•         He may want to know/date/marry a girl who is a Christian, so he realizes this is necessary.
•         He may want to feel some assurance that he won't go to hell for eternity.
•         He may want to make sure he is going to go to heaven when he dies.

I'm sure there are more reasons than these. The point is that they are no different than how everyone who is of this world makes decisions. They always ask, "How does this benefit me?" All of these reasons are desires of the flesh. The worldly origin of this apparent spiritual activity is exposed with his and others' responses. As soon as he says, "Amen" to the prayer, he may be praised and encouraged that he is saved and a part of God's family. He feels like he loves, thinks he has believed, and his obedience to pray gains the praise of his conscience also. It is the white-washed, religious version of "the boastful pride of life." The result: the seed of the Standard Bearer already implanted in his spiritual DNA by his physical birth is significantly watered as he is told it is a "new birth."

Unfortunately what takes place is a spiritual "still-birth." He is born dead! Well, in reality, he was already spiritually dead, but now his deadness appears dressed in white. He then proceeds to white-wash the tomb. He thinks that his prayer of faith is the same as his obedience and love for God. So, he lives his life like he began–looking to himself to believe enough, obey enough, and love enough. He expects the same of others.

Over a period of years, some Standard Bearers discover many standards on issues that they think to be biblical and godly to show their obedience. They are able to do them and feel blessed by doing them. Usually they are taught that they need to be disciple-makers. Consequently, and unfortunately, they do to others as was done unto them, and another generation of Standard Bearers are born–dead.

Other Standard Bearers however are more attracted to the things of the world. Since the prevailing motive of their "free will" decision was to produce their own happiness, the things of the world offer a greater prospect of fulfillment and happiness than a life of self-restraint and religious standard bearing. So, usually in the name of "freedom" they cast off the religious restraints of their parents and adopt standards more suitable to their desires–yet they think they are "saved."

The Apostle Paul countered such thinking when he wrote, "For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more" (1 Corinthians 9:19). Later in I Corinthians 10:23 he wrote, "All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify." Let's not be deceived by the false notion that "freedom of self-expression" is the aim of the new birth. As we'll see, love for God and others springs out of Spirit-born faith through the new birth.

Not all Standard Bearers can detect or recognize themselves in the experience above. I couldn't for seventeen years! Like Nicodemus, I became a leader in my church because of my knowledge, public performance of high standards, natural gifting, and zeal. I didn't even suspect I wasn't born again until I began to hear about the work of the Holy Spirit in new birth and the false notions of which I've written above. That's why understanding regeneration or new birth is vital and why distinguishing faith from love is absolutely necessary. It is possible for someone to do good things, express his "freedom", and still be spiritually dead. How? The "faith" exercised above is natural faith, born out of flesh, and Jesus taught clearly that which is born of flesh is flesh (John 3:6). Within man dwells no good thing (Rom. 7:18). So anything of flesh, done by the so-called "free will" of man, is hostile to God and produces death (Rom. 8:7). The world has not been overcome in this person's life, and here's the deception, he thinks it has because his standards are contrary to the world's standards.

The birth of a True Image Bearer

A True Image Bearer is born ALIVE TO GOD. A miracle takes place in his life by the power of the Holy Spirit. At His appointed day and hour, on the basis of Jesus' death and life, God sends His Spirit to transform a person's heart when he hears the gospel in the Word of God. I like the way John Piper describes the new birth. "The meaning of faith is that eyes go open and Christ becomes beautiful as our righteousness, our punishment, our treasure, our King, and our Lord. The immediate, no-lapse-in-time response is RECEIVE. Faith is the receiving of Christ." Love is action out of the overflow of fullness that comes through faith. It is nothing less than Jesus' love supernaturally moving through him.

The True Image Bearer knows there's nothing in himself that is good or faithful. He sees and embraces simultaneously and forever the root of his salvation–Jesus' faith, righteousness, love, death, and advocacy standing on his behalf before God. Having experienced the power of the gospel, he then lives the same way as he was born into God's kingdom. He realizes the only way he can love God and others is to be a conduit of the grace of God revealed in Christ by the Holy Spirit living within him.

What is his boast? In Christ alone! That which is born of Spirit is spirit (John 3:6) and the fruit of it is life and peace (Rom. 8:7). Why? Because the new birth by the Holy Spirit has given repentance regarding the values and elemental principles of the world. The standards he keeps have no value at all except that they are expressions of his faith in Christ. He does not see those standards as his identity. They are only a blessing because they are from his relationship with the Holy Spirit and flow from the life of Christ in heaven.

The True Image Bearer therefore wants to and longs to love God and others for Jesus' sake and for His glory. Just as his eyes were opened by the Holy Spirit for God's glory and pleasure, in the same way he desires for others to find their satisfaction in God for His glory. Whether it is his children, parents, friends, parishioners, or readers, he sees love for God as leading them to find their total satisfaction in Him through Jesus Christ. He knows that if he leads them to choose the right things and obey for any reason other than the enabling work of the Spirit to love and glorify God in Christ, then he hasn't loved God or them.

Lest you think I'm advocating sinless perfection, or even something close to it, I'm not! The True Image Bearer has sin (1 John 1:8) and humbly confesses it (1 John 1:9) while trusting completely in the advocacy of Jesus Christ (1 John 2:1). So my point is this:

Your understanding of the new birth and the difference between faith and love is significant

When the Apostle Paul wrote, "He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5), he was saying that God has taken not only our worst deeds, but also our best and most righteous deeds out of consideration. The new birth is 100% God's mercy!

I hope this has helped you further understand the curse of the Standard Bearer. Indeed, one is cursed if he thinks God is pleased with him and that he is born again because he has made good choices and lives by high standards when in fact God considers him hostile and dead! If this is you, may God have mercy and open the eyes of your heart to see the freedom and glory of God in giving Jesus Christ to be your righteousness and the Holy Spirit to be your Lord. Look to Him for life and love God for His sake, not your own. You may live in His presence, not for others or yourself, but for His glory. Then love and obedience will flow out of an internal supernatural fountain to God and to others. For His glory, you won't feel compelled to control and fix people who have yet to see what you see. Release them to Him. Let God do His work in them while Jesus loves through you.

If you have experienced the new birth as described above, then I know you rejoice and give glory to God. May this encourage you to lead others to find their total satisfaction and motive for their actions to be rooted in God's love for them and their love for Him through Jesus Christ. As you have received mercy, so extend it to others for His glory.

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            Norm Wakefield
            Elijah Ministries
            P.O. Box 377
            Bulverde, Texas 78163
            830.980.5606
            info@spiritofelijah.com
            http://www.spiritofelijah.com

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