Perfect love drives out fear.
Encourage each other to break through the cycle of sin.
Challenge each other towards love and good works.
How do we use perfect love to encourage and challenge instead of put off?
13For you were called to be free, brothers and sisters; only don’t use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but serve one another through love. 14For the whole law is fulfilled in one statement: Love your neighbor as yourself. 15But if you bite and devour one another, watch out, or you will be consumed by one another.
Galatians 5:13-15
If perfect love drives out fear, then encouraging & challenging each other will not produce biting and devouring one another.
However, if we bite and devour each other, we do not have perfect love. People will fear being a part of the Community. No longer will people go to church just because “that’s what we do.” If they fear the Church, people will leave the Church.
This should not be.
Jesus tells us those outside the Church will know us “by our love for one another.” However, when all those outside the Church look inside and see biting and devouring, they want no part in it.
Taking this a step further, when Paul wrote Galatians 5:15, I believe he had a foot in Isaiah 9:18-21…
18For wickedness burns like a fire
Isaiah 9:18-21
that consumes thorns and briers
and kindles the forest thickets
so that they go up in a column of smoke.
19The land is scorched
by the wrath of the Lord of Armies,
and the people are like fuel for the fire.
No one has compassion on his brother.
20They carve meat on the right,
but they are still hungry;
they have eaten on the left,
but they are still not satisfied.
Each one eats the flesh of his arm.
21Manasseh eats Ephraim,
and Ephraim, Manasseh;
together, both are against Judah.
In all this, his anger has not turned away,
and his hand is still raised to strike.
God tells Isaiah, “My wrath is poured out through my people devouring one another.” See all the social media fights among the Church devouring one another? See a church devouring each other? That’s God’s wrath on his people played out for all to see.
And his people have no clue. They think they’re doing God a favor. All the while, he’s just letting them bite and chew on one another.
Instead, choose the way of Paul…use your freedom to serve one another. Use your freedom to love your neighbor as yourself. Use your freedom to make others better.
Instead of biting and devouring each other, use your freedom to serve one another.
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Perfect love involves encouraging and challenging. I believe healthy people aren’t afraid of others speaking into their lives…even if it is difficult to hear. They want others to lean into their lives to be able to lead them closer to Jesus. They just want people to do the challenging who have relational equity and their best interest in mind.
Relational equity is built by serving each other.
Daily interaction doesn’t mean we have church services every day. You can have daily interaction with the Church, the Community, daily through your phone. Texting each other encouragement and challenge is showing perfect love and daily interacting with his people.
Encouraging and challenging without perfect love will put people off…not draw them in. Serve others so you can build relational equity to earn the right to encourage and challenge each other inside the Community.
How have others used their freedom to serve you? How can you use your freedom to serve others?