The right way to be wrong

The good book, the Bible, says that love is more important than knowledge. It is better if faithful have love built with the knowledge of God and his ways, as children God could be lost in the jungle of the devil due to lack of knowledge. If we must choose, however, love without knowledge is more useful than knowledge without love.

 

The disciple John claims that he is loved by the lord the most, while Peter claims that he loved the lord the most. Jesus did ask Peter 3 times, to remind him of his evil temptation to challenge the word of the lord, if he loves the lord the most. Peter, every time, answered yes, and every answer was followed by the order that Peter should look after the church. Jesus did not give his church to John, the beloved disciple, but to Peter who loved the lord the most, while reminding him to correct his evil temptation to challenge the word of the Lord. The trusted persons with the management of the church are not those who are loved by the lord the most, but those who love the lord the most. This is because the love of the lord is more important.

 

Peter is the troublemaker, who tries to advise the lord himself and sometimes even try to contradict the word of the lord. That is why even when Peter is told to eat unclean animals, the order happens 3 times. God is saying, don’t contradict me, and remember the roster. Besides, Peter is taken into the hill, with John and Jacob, and the word in the cloud is that they should listen to Jesus, as Jesus is the beloved son of the Heavenly Father. Obedience to Jesus was a problem that Peter had, though he loved the lord the most. Peter was never perfect, even when the heavenly father opened his heart to the fact that Jesus is Christ. Yet Peter loved the lord the most. Love of God is more powerful than our knowledge of God. If we love God, the lord will find a way to teach us his ways then after.    

 

Paul was the most wrong. He was hunting the faith and imprisoning the disciples of the lord. Yet, Paul was a straight (honest) hunter of the faith. He was on the wrong side but that is only because he believed that the wrong side is the right side. Paul was an example of all sinners of the Gentiles world, who are wrong not because they love evil and hate good, but because they don’t know the difference between good and evil. What God did is open his eyes to show him that Jesus is alive and turn him into his dedicated soldier in building the church of the Gentiles that we are. Evil people will not love Jesus because their light is nothing but darkness. If good people love the lord, it is because they have a trace of his light in their eye and when they see more perfect light compared to what they have, they are easily dazzled by it.   

 

You could be wrong because you want God of your preference rather than being faithful to God’s preference, as Peter was. If you have love of God, however, this can be corrected. You could be wrong because you don’t know which side is evil and which side is good. If you have a good heart, you can learn the goodness of God, in its proper time. Those are a few of the right ways to be wrong. On this foundation, now, I can explain my point, below.  

 

I have listened to one great servant of God saying that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He also insisted that Jesus does not change his teaching. If people are wrong in terms of the word of God, therefore, they are not of God. Then he teaches that the Law is the holiness of God and the Law is the perfect holiness of God. But we know only God is holy, and only Jesus is holy, therefore. The only holiness that we see, touch, and live with is Jesus. Jesus is the very image of the holy heavenly father. Only Jesus is perfectly holy, as not even Angels are without error. Jesus, with his life, his teaching, his death, and his resurrection from death to stand on the right side of the heavenly father is the perfect image of the heavenly father’s holiness. Jesus is the holy perfection, not the Law.    

 

The word that the Law is holy does not mean that the Law is an image of God or that the name of God is on the Law. Besides, it is written that the Law is molded to accommodate the heart of the Jewish people, as they will not be obedient to the perfect Law of God. It is not a perfect Law, therefore. The perfect Law is called the Truth and the Truth is the lord Jesus Christ. Jesus is the wisdom of God, the logos of God, the Law of God, and the Truth of God. We have Laws of physics and when they are perfected they become the Truth of physics. Jesus is the Truth, he is the perfect Law. So Jesus is more than the Law of Moses. The word means logos, which implies the eternal Law of creation is Jesus. Truth is Jesus, and Holiness is Jesus because he is the image of the Heavenly Father and the name of the Heavenly Father is on him.

 

This very elementary fact is missed by a great servant of the lord. Is Jesus changing his teaching, therefore? Can we conclude this great man of God is the devil's own? The word of God is our mirror and we all need to know that there are major mistakes in our understanding of the bible. That is all of us, except Jesus. Fortunately, love is more important than knowledge. I am sure this man of God is trying to make the faithful holy in the image of the lord, and he makes few mistakes here and there in the way, as we all do. We have to ask: what is the fruit of his effort? The fruit is that he will make people holy, not in the image of the Law, but in the image of the Lord Jesus Christ. Evil people will build sin with knowledge, he is building holiness despite having some mistakes here and there. This is why, Love is more important than knowledge.    

 

I have the privilege to learn the bible by myself and the only one to teach me is the lord himself (without my knowledge). And, I know what I used to believe 7 years ago, 5 years ago, 3 years ago, 1 year ago, and even yesterday. As long as I desire to know God, as long as I have love of God because he loved me first, and as long as I am an honest sinner, God was/is patient to take me from one level of understanding to the next. Now I am surprised that I used to have those ideas and I know now that I was very infant to the faith. I am also hopeful my today will be worse than my tomorrow.  

 

Take the giants of our faith after the protestant moment and look at their theology, understanding, and behavior. You will see none of them are close to perfection in terms of theology, and most of them are without optimal behavior. God sent them what they could carry at that time. In the next generation, a new revelation follows. This process is going on up to now. The church itself is learning to know the bible better over time. Why? The church was sold to the world by human culture and demonic theology that destroyed the faith, since the 4th century, until the protestant moment is ignited to correct it.  

 

After the protestant moment, God was taking his children step by step toward true faith. There is a lot of work of God in our history, and there is also a lot of problem in it, which is planted by the devil. The giants of our faith since the protestant reformation are not only major stepping stones of the faith but also with a lot of wrong luggage. Can we say because they make mistakes, they don’t belong to God? That will leave us with Jesus only because he is the only perfect one.

 

All of us are wrong from time to time, as we don’t understand everything right. But there is the right way to be wrong, like Peter and Paul, and there is the wrong way to be wrong, like Judah. Some are sleeping and not ready for the lord, so they need to wake up and our effort will continue until they wake up. Some are not interested in walking up but to sleep as they are enjoying their sleep at any cost. We are sure the judgment of such people is not far away.

 

Some brothers and sisters are on the very wrong track, and the more you know them, the more you see they are far away from the road of the lord. But you can see the love of the lord and the honesty of their mistakes to know who they are. They are lords' own. The only thing that surprised me is not why they make mistakes, I know the worst in me, but why God does not care enough to correct them. I know they are not bastards but lords own, but why is the lord treating them like bastards? A good father punishes, rebukes, and disciplines his children. I am sure God has good reason to make them fool of themselves. So, let us pray for them so the lord can open their heart to his teaching.

 

Many of us have a book of life of our own. We are writing and deleting names from our Book of Life to classify who is saved and who is not. A human being will say Saul (Paul) is the devil's own and Judah is the lord’s own. But God knows better as he only can know the heart and kidneys of people. Let us fight the wrong theology that people teach, without mercy, but let us be kind to the wrong kind of people who teach it, and let us pray for them. They are the sea destabilizing our faith, but the wind which is the source of all is the wrong theology that they teach for themselves.

 

Let us fight their darkness with light. Let us teach the true faith. If God is with us and with them, God himself will find a way to make us the right tool and will allow their heart to listen to it. If they are not God’s own, however, they will show their true nature over time. What Jesus did was teach, and they showed their true nature by crucifying him. After all, on the day that the lord says it is time, the lord can take whatever gift they have in a short period. People can work for decades to kick you from some space and you will overshine them more and more. The more they try, the more they lose because the lord did not will it. When the day is right, however, you will be surprised how things fall away this fast. Those deceptions of the devil will be over when it is time that they should be over and things will unfold quickly then after. Their future is in the hands of God, not our hands.  

That is why theological effort is more important by focusing on the wrong education than the wrong person. This will help us to teach them, to prepare the next generation that will take over, and in case God strikes them, within our time, to pick them up toward the hand of the lord. Our interest should be to defeat the devil and sin and to save our brothers and sisters from the grip of the devil. If there is 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and so on a chance for us, I am sure they are better than us because they sought the lord when we were running after the sin of this world. If the lord cares about us, I am sure the lord cares about them too.