Preach Righteousness - Walking the Tight Rope Between Truth And Love
Preach Righteousness = Proclaim What Is Right and True.
2 Peter 2:5 says Noah was a preacher of righteousness. The term preacher means a herald or messenger entrusted with authority conveying an official message of kings or commanders. This same idea is presented in the New Testament.
Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us:
we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.
2 Corinthians 5:20
An ambassador acts as a representative of the country from which they are from and they promote the message their king or authority gave them to promote. 2 Corinthians 5:20 tells us that we are Christ’s ambassadors. In John 18:36 Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Jesus prayed for His disciples in John 17:16 saying, “They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.”
So for you and I, this world is not our home, but for the time being, we live in this world as preachers of righteousness. The problem with our message is that few people want to hear it. But the fact that it is an unwanted message doesn’t mean we remain silent. However, we need to carry the message of Jesus in a way that honors who He is and His character.
In my blog posts, The Authority Of God’s Word Is The Reason For The Hope That Is In Me and The Foundation Of God’s Word Will Carry Us Through Every Storm I addressed the fact that Jesus is the word of God, divine, authoritative, truth, eternal, and the solid foundation on which to build our lives. That is where I stand. My core convictions and values find their root in the sure belief in the above statement. I hope as believers in Jesus, we would all “Amen” that statement.
God is Love
Now I want to bring in another key identifying trait of God that we also need to hold true to as ambassadors of Christ called to preach righteousness.
He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:8
And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love,
and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.
1 John 4:16
1 John 4:8 and 16 tells us that God is love. In other words, God’s very nature is love so He cannot act or speak in any way that isn’t rooted in the essence of His being and neither should we. Truth and love cannot be separated when we are living out our life in Christ. God speaks from who He is. He is love and His Word is truth. 2 Timothy 2:13 says, “He cannot deny Himself.” Titus 1:2 says, God cannot lie.
The reason I bring this into our discussion regarding our call to preach righteousness in our world today is because I think we find it hard to balance the stand for truth with love. I am amazed at the bold, harsh, and unloving way believers often confront others with truth. In many ways I see the enemy does a great job of dividing believers by getting them to lean toward one side of the other, toward truth or toward love.
God’s Word is completely, both love and truth, and balanced living starts with God’s word as our foundation and authority. The reality is that we all tend to lean heavily to one side or the other, toward truth or toward love.
Do you know what your default setting is?
Are you most likely to default to truth or to love?
If you don’t know, ask for God’s input. Ask yourself and ask God, Do I tend to lean to one side or the other toward love or truth? No shame in your answer, we all have predispositions, but how can we walk in balance if we never address our tendency to default to one side or the other? Ask God to help you, to transform you, and to balance your walk between love and truth.
We walk the tight rope between truth and love because we are true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ and He called us to share the gospel, a message of righteousness balanced between love and truth. Love without the safety net of truth tips the scales of God’s perfect gospel message. Truth without the safety net of love also tips the scales of God’s perfect gospel message.
The good news is that the inner power of our faith and the Holy Spirit enables us to walk balanced between truth and love even when our natural tendency is to tilt the scales.
Think about this statement:
Our faith and His Spirit connect truth and love in a life message that pleases God
and is palatable and stirring to the heart of man.
Now think about that statement in light of this Scripture verse:
Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
1 John 3:18 (NIV)
Words are meaningless if they aren’t backed up by actions. We can say we love, but if our actions don’t reflect love, people receiving our “love” words understand them as fake and false. Our actions actually speak for us. I am not diminishing the need to speak love but increasing the importance of our actions to agree with those words.
Think about it like this, Love + loving actions = visible love.
As Christians we are taught to walk by faith not sight. We are taught to see life through a spiritual lens because we have the Holy Spirit in us who illuminates life for us. Those who are not in Christ, those who we are called to share the gospel message with, don’t have the Holy Spirit in them to see beyond the physical and natural world. All the more reason, that our love must be visible to the world around us.
The problem for us is that visible love balanced with truth is not easy. We can’t logically or naturally dismantle the effects of our culture, our experiences, our religious environment, or our deeply ingrained backgrounds and biases. However, while it may not be easy, it is possible. This is where our faith comes in. We know that all things are possible with God and our victory is founded in our faith.
You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them,
because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.
1 John 4:4
For everyone born of God overcomes the world.
This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.
1 John 4:5
Our faith is the initiation point of possibilities of everything that is impossible in our own strength. Faith initiated our journey with Jesus and deeply rooted in every true Christ follower is His Spirit who is fully love and fully truth. Our faith and His Spirit work together to move us toward the center in a balanced walk and a balanced message of righteousness between love and truth.
