I often see many Christians go back and forth arguing with each other which message is more important, which needs to be preached to the masses more to bring people to God, and some even arguing as to which is the true message. The church often just seems confused, some calling these love messages watered down Christianity, while some others see these Christians preaching the message of repantance as old fashioned fire and brimstone preachers teaching a God of condemnation. I could be very wrong, because The Lord knows I am not perfect, but I think both sides might be missing it. From everything I have read in the Bible and even experienced on my walk, it's both.
From what I have come to understand, even the message of repentance comes from love, because it is not a call to simply confess your sins but to change and make yourself righteous before The Lord. That is what John was preaching in the wilderness and that is what is often missing in many of the messages preached by these Christians who talk only of God's love and forgiveness. They politely skip over the fact that even though God love's us unconditionally and wants us to have a blessed and abundant life, that we can't do it simply by saying I'm sorry God and not changing our lifestyle, because than our words were meaningless, there was no heart in it. God does require a change in us but it's not something we do on our own, we do it with the help of His Holy Spirit, He requires us to abandon our old way of life and step forward new and clean; following after Him and walking in His ways. This is why the disciples left everything behind to follow Jesus, it is an example of sacrificing an old life, a sinful life, for a righteous one with Christ. And God asks us to do this out of love for us, He wants us to change because left to this life on our own, in this world we will be lead to destruction, and an eternity separated from His presence.
Now about our fire and brimstone brothers and sisters, they certainly have it right that we must repent before The Lord, we must cast off our old selves and old ways and become new in Christ, I cannot, and will not argue that. Where do I see that they are missing it? Some, not all, but some focus so much on the condemnation of our sinful life that they leave little room for God's love to change you. They beat you down so heavily with the fact that you are a sinner that its easy to feel low, discouraged, and unworthy. Which is not the way God wants us to feel, loving and serving God should not feel like we are serving a cruel and demeaning master, because if that were the case we couldn't love God. We instinctively hate things that cause us pain and avoid it, that's why messages of repentance and condemnation that are not paired with a love message often fail to bring people to God.
Both messages are right, both are good but not by themselves. If we want to bring people to God and show them who our Father is we need to teach both. We need to stop bickering amongst ourselves about who knows God's word best, and who is reading from the right or wrong translation. It's not about that, it's about God. It's about spreading His light by our actions, we are His hands and feet here on earth and the sooner we start working together instead of fighting the sooner we will see change.
Revelation 2:21
I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling.
1 Peter 1:22
Now that you have purified yourself by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply from the heart.
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