Preemptive Love

Some people define the teachings of Jesus as being pacifist or "non-violent", and while I don't disagree with that assessment, I prefer the terms "Preemptive Love" and "Proactive Agape."

Here's why.

Rather than frame the example and ethic of Jesus as something we don't do, or something we avoid doing, I prefer to frame it in terms of what Jesus DID do and what He DOES tell us to do: Love Preemptively.

Our first and constant posture is always love. This means we are already loving before our enemy attacks us. Our love for them is not reactive, it is proactive. Just as His love for us isn't reacting to anything we have done or will do. He just loves us - and everyone - all the time. Our love is what initiates action because love is a verb.

So, as we follow Jesus we are always loving because He is always loving us. As His love for us is poured into us and over us and through us, we also reflect that love and funnel that love and redirect that perfect, unmerited, unconditional love right back out to everyone around us.

Love begins with God and continues in, and through, us. We are His ambassadors of love. We are the incarnation of love in this world today.

Non-violence suggests that we are holding violence back, or that we are denying the violence within us. But Preemptive Love declares that we are beings who are so perfectly and constantly loved by God that we are being transformed into carriers of love who cannot help but love Him in return and others at all times.

Let's love preemptively and practice agape proactively.

"If anyone claims to be in Him, he must walk as Jesus did." - 1 John 2:6

Beloved One

The entire Universe resonates with love for you.

Your name is on the lips of the Almighty.
Your face is precious to Him.

Your laugh is music. Your smile is His everlasting joy.

The planets spin in response to this love.
The stars burn bright with the heat of it.

Everything He has made is designed to declare His everlasting love for you.
None of it means half as much to Him as you do.

He longs to gather you to Himself. 

He dreams of one day dancing with you at a feast that He’s been preparing for the last 2,000 years.

One day you will see Him face to face. 

On that day, you will look into His eyes and see for yourself how deep and endless His love is for you.

But until that day, He invites you to come away and sit with Him. Listen for His voice.
Delight yourself in Him as He delights Himself in you.

The entire Universe resonates with love for you.

Your name is on His heart.

Make your heart His home. 

Let Him come and live and breathe in you now.

Start today.

-kg

LOVE LIKE JESUS

The Family That Love Built

After the horrific church shooting in Charleston, many are calling for Christians to start carrying weapons to church. One GOP Presidential candidate, pastor Mike Huckabee even said, “It sounds crass, but frankly the best way to stop a bad person with a gun is to have a good person with a weapon that is equal or superior to the one that he’s using.”

While we can applaud Huckabee’s conscience for admitting how crass his statement sounds, we must also point out how decidedly anti-Christian it is, too.

Thankfully, we don’t have to look much further than the Christians who were the victims of this shooting for a better example of how an actual follower of Jesus responds to violence.

“No matter how much hate there is in the world, it's no match for love" Chis Singleton, son of slain Sharonda Singleton, said. “Love is always stronger than hate.”

And the daughter of Ethel Lance, addressing the killer directly in court, said, “I will never talk to her ever again. I will never be able to hold her ever again. But I forgive you." 

She added: "You hurt me, you hurt a lot of people. May God forgive you." 

Anthony Thompson, husband of the slain Myra Thompson, echoed Lance's daughter's words. "I forgive you, my family forgives you," he said.

Felecia Sanders, the grandmother who shielded her 5-year-old granddaughter from the gunfire, but lost her son in process, told the killer that the parishioners "welcomed you Wednesday night at our Bible study with open arms."  

She continued, fighting tears: "You have killed some of the most beautiful people that I know… And it will never be the same. But as we said in Bible study, we enjoyed you. May God have mercy on you."

Alana Simmons, granddaughter of victim Daniel Simmons, said: "Although my grandfather and the other victims died at the hands of hate…everyone's plea for your soul is proof that they lived and loved and their legacies will live on.”

"Hate won't win," she concluded firmly.

A relative added, "I am a work in progress and I acknowledge that I am very angry. But we are the family that love built. We have no room for hate so we have to forgive."

While Christians like Huckabee can only suggest bigger and more powerful weapons to solve problems like hate and violence, these dear followers of Jesus – the ones most directly injured by the murders – have demonstrated what the most powerful weapons against hate really are – Love and Forgiveness.

Now, imagine a world where Christians carry guns to church. Imagine a scenario like the one in Charleston where the killer enters and is shot to death by a minister of the Gospel of Jesus. What sort of message would that send? Certainly not one of mercy, and grace, and love. How would that bear witness to the power and the truth of the Gospel? Not at all.

The pastor who lost his life in Charleston can stand before His Lord and Savior in Eternity and hear the words, “Well done, my good and faithful servant” because the evidence of the Gospel he preached is now on display in the midst of this tragedy for the entire world to see.

This is why Christian nonviolence makes sense. This is why Jesus commanded His followers to overcome evil with love, not with more evil.

The killer wanted to start a civil war between the races. If Christians listen to people like Huckabee, the killer will get exactly what he wanted.

But if Christians listen to their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, then the killer and everyone else will, instead, experience the uncommon, otherworldly, extravagant enemy love that only Jesus can teach us.

May the whole world take notice of what a real follower of Jesus looks like in America today. They are the loved ones of those who were gunned down by hate, but they are also the family that love built, and they have no room for hate, only for love.

Thank you for showing us what the love of Jesus looks like in the real world.

-kg

NOTE: Quotes taken from this article in The Daily Mail and People.com