To Love or To Be Right

Posted on February 15, 2018 by Graeme Wilson in Victory Call

Female with red paper heart shape on white background.
POW! Right in the kisser. (Can I say that in a Christian devo?)
I was sitting there next to my husband, so unsuspecting. He didn’t even see it happen. John and I had gone to an evening seminar on Anger and Peace at the local seminary.
Dr. Ed Welch, the seminar speaker, didn’t see it happen… but it was his fault!
Dr. Welch was telling a personal story when he shared how God intervened in his own thoughts with this simple question – “But did you love?”
In that moment, God began to prick my own spirit with an appalling reality.  After being a believer almost 35 years, it was the first time this thought occurred to me:  I am more motivated by being right than I am to love my neighbor. Often believing I was right about something… anything, I pressed my point even if it may have hurt the other person (no love there). It wasn’t necessarily my purpose to hurt them, but my desire, dare I say – ill-conceived – need, was to be right.
I am not proud to share that; in fact I am greatly humbled (most likely God’s purpose in revealing the ugliness of my heart to me).
Soon God’s Word started to pop into my heart and mind:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
“So now faith, hope, love abide, these three, but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:13
By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. 1 John 3:16-18
God is love. When being right is my greatest passion – I fail to love God or to love as God loves. I fail to imitate Christ. I fail to live up to my calling – I fail to reflect my Creator, Savior, and Redeemer.
Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Ephesians 5:1-2
I’m not sure if anyone else out there can identify with what I’m saying. I’m sure there are many that have no idea what I am talking about and that is okay; maybe one of the other Victory Calls this week will hit home for you.
But to those that do understand, let me say:

  1. None of us is always right.
  2. It’s okay to be right, but it is the heart attitude we bring with it that matters.
  3. It’s okay to be right and to keep silent (this is only possible by Christ living through us).
  4. It is more important to God that we love rather than be right.
  5. I don’t need to be right because JESUS is ALWAYS right!

If you find yourself in a similar place this morning, let’s together start with:
Confession and Repentance (turning away from having to be right and turn towards God by loving Him and loving others).
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9; Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. Matthew 3:8
Meditate on the Cross – for this sin, too, is under the blood.
He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. 1 Peter 2:24
Embrace forgiveness—
And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. Colossians 2:13-14
In faith, love first and foremost –
if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. 1 John 4:12
You have my permission to email me to ask me how I am doing– loving more than having to be right.  Let me know how you are doing too.
Blessings,
Diane
Diane Hunt serves part-time on the staff of America’s Keswick providing ministry support from her home in North Carolina. She is also a biblical counselor and women’s event speaker. For more information about having Diane speak at your next event please contact her at dhunt@americaskeswick.org.

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