Perfecting Love

“God does not want our affection, He wants our love.

God does not want our lips, He wants our heart. “

          Most of our problem is rooted in the lack of love. Because when are walking in love, fear, anger, rebellion, anxiety, selfishness, worry, discouragement, rejection, and offense have no hold in us. The key for peace, joy, and righteousness is to walk in love. Let’s say we can do acts of love, such as go on a mission trip, but we don’t have love, it won’t profit much. If we, as Christians, don’t perfect love, anything we do will profit nothing. When we are walking in love, we are walking in the spirit because God is love and He is Spirit. You can have faith for healings, miracles, but if love is not perfected in you, you are not reaching the fullness of Christ. I have not seen one person that is walking in it, but God wants to bring us to the same level of love as Jesus had. The key is to die to yourself – there is no greater love than to lay down your own life - so in dying, His love will be perfected in you. 

          There is a huge misconception about love. One of them is that love is feeling. No. On the cross, God showed two things to the max: God’s love for you and God’s hate for sin. In both cases, the max measure of love!

“Let us love one another.” 1 John 4
          Every time you feel that God does not love you, you better look at the cross. When God gave us Jesus, it was not because we deserve Him, but because He loves us. All that He wants back is for us to love Him and one another. We ought to love, not like the World tells us to love, but with the same measure as the Father, the same extreme. 
          Love perfects boldness. We have boldness in the Day of Judgment, in the day when people accuse you, you still love them. 
          You can be affectionate with Jesus but not in love with Him. Because you obey Him! You can worship Him with your lips, be affectionate, but your heart can be far from Him. Judas betrayed Jesus with what? A kiss, with his affection. This is what some do every Sunday. 
When we are just affectionate with Jesus, we want the benefits of the cross, but we are not in love with Him. They come to Jesus because of the lust of what He can give you. God is saying: “Keep your lips, and give me your heart.” 
          When your love is where it is supposed to be, affection will happen automatically. So you won’t need a date night with Jesus (Sunday meeting). It will happen naturally.

          “I am trying to love”. Stop trying and just abide in the vine. Love has power, love always leaves a mark, and love never fails. Humanistic love is like spiritual masturbation. You can’t try to do this with your own hands. When we strive to love God and one another, we take our eyes from the cross. Stop striving and let the love of God be perfected in us. 
          The secret prayer is not even a little closet. It is in Him, the cleft of the rock. If prayers take you there, you better pray. Hide yourself there. I know people that have prayed all day and they have no love. I know people that are full of revelation but they have no love. 
           Love is dead to the flesh and alive to Christ. That is perfected love. There is no lust in love. When you pray, when you ask, you get it because nothing that you are asking is from your own lust. 
          If you keep His command, you keep yourself in His love. He does not want you in fear, in strife. Every time you obey His word, His joy remains in you and your joy is full. When your joy is full, your love is full.
          Perfected love brings us to perfect rest and perfect peace. You can only walk in what you love.  

          Do you really want to please God? Let love be perfected in you.

Click here to listen to the full message: Perfecting Love, by Shane W Roessiger