1 John 2:15-16 English Standard Version

Do Not Love the World

¹⁵ Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. ¹⁶ For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world.

Love of the world here in the Greek is agapaō which is not the same as agapē which is the love of the Father. There are many different words for love in the Greek and it is not always easy to distinguish which one is meant where. How we understand what is said is important in how we respond to the scriptures written to us and for us.

Love of the world for me, and I ask anyone to seek their own understanding, means to prefer. Here is why I understand it this way, my perspective, not yours, not do I prefer that you should choose my understanding. Seek your own.

Coffee is bitter to me and I prefer to drink it with a creamer that will sweeten it. When I go to the store now I buy Italian sweet cream for myself and hazelnut for my wife and my sister-in-law. I prefer one over another. My choice, no big deal, so what? It harms no one.

I prefer my wife over any other woman on the face of the earth. It does no harm to the other women around me. If I should prefer another woman over my wife it would wound her and cause great harm to our relationship.

Paul includes desire of the flesh and eyes to accentuate the two different uses of the word love in the same sentence. They are different Greek words translated as love. God’s love is sometimes said to be a love feast which implies not only abundance but also variety. His banquet table offers up every tasty delight which will satisfy everyone no matter what they prefer.

Micah 2:3-5 English Standard Version

³ Therefore thus says the Lord: behold, against this family I am devising disaster, from which you cannot remove your necks, and you shall not walk haughtily, for it will be a time of disaster.
⁴ In that day they shall take up a taunt song against you and moan bitterly, and say, “We are utterly ruined; he changes the portion of my people; how he removes it from me! To an apostate he allots our fields.”
⁵ Therefore you will have none to cast the line by lot in the assembly of the Lord.

Apostate is defined as a person who renounces a religious or political belief or principle.

Martin Luther was an apostate. He changed the portion of believers and that was only the beginning. What began was the reformation, a reforming of religious beliefs. That has everything to do with personal faith. When we come before the Lord we will not be able to plead religion as justification when we are called before the judgment seat.

The party line carries no weight. It is one on one before our God.

We will answer what we, as humans, have done to live by faith in the Son who died for us.

When we recognize the Lord as our Lord, who was always Lord, there will be a time when we make our humanity take a back seat to faith.

That awakening is a personal event. We do not all make it in any kind of definable order. There is no list to order up our conformance to Christ. Some might see Him as a big brother, the first son of many. Some might not see Him that way and see Him as friend, or teacher, or prophet, or the great physician.

Nor do we have the right to tell others they are wrong if the great physician is what they need today.

He is our all in all.