[gersonian]

“The one who loves his brother abides in the Light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness blinded his eyes.” -1 John 2:9-10

“The one who loves his brother.” It is a simple phrase, but it holds more difficulty than scaling Everest. Abiding in the light is not the same as loving your brother or sister, but it is essential if we do want to love our brother or sister.

John gives us these two verses, which give us a picture of human relationships for the Christian. It is a litmus test to whether we are abiding in the Light or in the Dark. I have to ask myself, “Am I loving those around me?” It is an easy thing to find out if you are brave enough to ask. The danger in asking is twofold. You might get an answer you don’t like or agree with. Or you might get an answer that you do like, and it flatters your sensibilities.

The Answer You Don’t Like

The danger in asking is twofold. You might get an answer you don’t like or agree with. Or you might get an answer that you do like, and it flatters your sensibilities. The first danger is in its direct attack on your own pride and self-image. You might think you are a pretty good person. “I take care of my family and provide for them.” But your wife feels uncherished, unloved, and unappreciated. “How dare she? Doesn’t she understand all you have done for her?” Your kids might not listen to your instructions or quite possibly openly rebel against your rules. It is easy to feel justified in those moments to give in to anger, yelling, or maybe worse. “Don’t they know that I am doing all this for their good?”

Here is the hard truth: it really doesn’t matter what you think. It matters what they think. If your wife feels unloved, then chances are you are not loving her well. If your kids see you as reacting in anger and out of what are quite possibly deeper underlying issues of control or wounds, whether or not they can identify them, they will feel unloved, uncared for.

Genuine love comes from abiding in the light of Christ and is sacrificial and full of grace and generosity. It could be that your spouse is being unreasonable or emotional or something else, but if your reaction is one of defense or reaction, then there is something there that needs digging out, crucified.

The Negative Narratives

For myself, I often find myself dealing with the wound/thoughts of being misunderstood. As a kid growing up with ADHD, impulsivity often got me into trouble when I really had no intention in doing anything wrong. It is widely agreed and quoted that the average kid with ADHD experiences 20,000 more negative corrective messages than a kid without by the age of 12. It shapes every single one of us who deals with it. I can live with the expectation that I am about to be corrected for something I had no idea I was doing wrong. The lie that I have to battle is one that says, “I am screwing up…again” and “I’ll never get it right.”

Identifying those negative narratives, those lies that the enemy pokes and prods at, is so important. They must be confronted with the truth of Scripture and the love of Christ. Otherwise, I will, we will continue to react out of self-protection rather than the love of Christ.

Loving the Broken

Now there is another issue that can arise with this first idea. You can be told you aren’t really loving, but the individual is not capable of receiving genuine love. It is common today for individuals to say that to love them, “you must accept me as I am.” Well, this often means accepting all their sins and flaws and calling them good and right. Another common phrase is, “You do you, keep doing what makes you happy.” This is a worldly and destructive kind of love. It is based not on the love of Christ but on the accommodations or enabling of others. This kind of love is rooted all the way back in the Garden where Eve saw what was good in her own eyes and took the apple. This kind of love is based on our own perception and our own judgment.

When we look at Scripture, we see two distinct types of wisdom: earthly/human wisdom and spiritual/heavenly wisdom, the wisdom that comes from God. The former comes from man’s desire to formulate their own wisdom and guide for life. It is the sin of the garden. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and pretty much everyone in the story of Scripture deals with these issues. The author of Genesis is brilliant in using the words of Eve in part or whole again and again to signify to us when someone is replaying the fall.

Allowing others to live according to this kind of wisdom is not loving. Solomon in Proverbs makes it clear that this type of wisdom will lead to their destruction. To say it in a positive way, they will never become all that God wants them to be if they are allowed to walk in earthly wisdom.

Flattering Response

The last danger is that asking others might be a polite or flattering response, or they will be so unfamiliar with genuine love that they cannot identify areas that are shaded with hate. If you are someone in a position of authority, especially spiritual authority, this is of particular danger. It will be all too easy to receive the compliments of others and excuse the criticisms of others as dissension or divisiveness or jealousy.

Beware the flattering words of others. Turn them over to Christ and lay them at His feet. The good others see should be a sign that God is at work and not that you have arrived.

The Hard Work of Love

Do we want to grow in our love for others? Do we want the Light of Christ,¨ to be reflected so clearly from our lives that others see Him? Then, we should embrace the difficult work of polishing and beating out the dents in our finish. It is something that Jesus is kind to help heal and mend if we want Him to.

Humility is so highly prized, but it is so difficult to obtain because of the pain required. Here is the great result of living a life of abiding love. We will be so full of the Light and Love of Christ that we will not stumble and fall. We will find our paths well lit. Our houses bright with the warmth of love.

How often do I let darkness creep in, and I find myself stumbling about, grasping for hope or direction wherever I can? Anxiety, fear, uncertainty, pain, loneliness. These are the results of walking in the dark. The results are often outbursts of anger, jealousy, pride, and the list can go on.

I can recall a time when I was alone at home growing up. It was night, and my parents were out with friends for dinner. We lived a little way into the country, and our house was nestled in the woods a little way back from the road. Looking out the window, it seemed so dark and foreboding. It was as if anything could come out from any direction and get at our house.

This is what it is like not to be living in the light of day. We have so many artificial lights these days that we have forgotten the oppressiveness and uncertainty of a moonless night without light. But we choose this night, and even more, we choose to stumble around in it, banging shins, scraping arms, stepping in mud and falling into ravines.

In this darkness, everyone is our enemy. Our pain and suffering are everyone else’s fault. We thrash about in fear, warding off all those who are trying to help. It isn’t until we are like a blind beggar and cry out for Jesus to heal us that we will find that the path was always next to us, and he was offering help all along.