What's Love Got To Do With It

Let’s sing it again, second verse same as the first, “All we need is love, la, la, la, la”!
Tina Turner did a great spin on that in her song “what’s love got to do with it” a powerful sharing of her liberation from a road of abuse and torment.

For those interested, a view of previous thoughts, look here.

We in the Christian church and I use that word “church” loosely, have been exposed to the foundational corner stone of love, His love, from its very beginnings, and yet we have at best dismissed it or better yet, turned it into a great theology of methods, principles and precepts, something geared especially to those with sharp minds.
Speaking of minds, the necessary renewing of them, the transformation of our soul revolves around the elusiveness of that indwelt corner stone, Love, it is not a picnic basket chalk full of tantalizing principles or precepts of how-to’s! Grace His grace resoundingly remains truly amazing.

What hasn’t taken a prominent place, center stage within the church down through the ages, tongues, prophecy, miracles, signs and wonders, and in so doing crowding out (it would appear) the shinning brilliance of the source of all that really matters, God the Father and his son the living Christ of love? Whole denominations, movements, clubs have sprung up revolving around any of the a-fore mentioned tokens of his deep love for us, and have you like me asked why is that? Doesn’t it all come down to ego’s, honestly isn’t it really more about us, look at me, look at my gift/s that I can clearly demonstrate to you, and in fact I can teach you to have it.
The distribution of the gifts is done by the Father, they are not taught!

In the catalogue of gifts described by Paul in the scriptures as wonderful as they are, pale in comparison to the greatest of all gifts, the one that is NOT ALL about me, love. The one that will endure forever, the one called the greatest and is really all about others, being what they need in the moment.

This message of the Father’s unconditional love is simply way to explosive to be caged within the confines of organized religious hoop jumping, touched upon by so called great expository teaching or preaching limited to a ‘teaching’, remember, it’s an unfolding revelation, not a seminar.

As I said on my last blog entry I would try to share further thoughts on what I observed at the conversations with Wayne gathering last Saturday, so here goes.
One out standing thing I heard was with regards to the fear of being mislead, possibly even deceived, the fear of letting go of all that we thought was able to bring us, keep us alive and without fear. Trying to juggle this love message of the Father’s love for us and trying to make it fit within the already deeply established methods we have used. I could almost hear the grinding of the gears as this processing was taking place and yet outwardly the poker faces would not indicate my illuminating discerned intuitive gleanings.
Maybe the life-support system of the matrix of religion with its methodology of principles and precepts has in fact robed us of our rich inheritance in Christ, I say with tongue firmly embedded in cheek.
The gifted one Christ was there in our gathering, that is unquestionable, and yet without Him opening our hearts to his living words, much of what was shared primarily through Wayne might be nothing more than seen and heard as that which was going to launch some further into “their” calling and ministry!

As I sat there (coming in after they already started) I felt like a Cheshire cat, grinning from ear to ear soaking, bathing in the living shower of a highly recognizable voice of the Father slinging grace all over the place through Wayne.
Within this intoxicating overflow of His heart for us all, it was as if I could hear echoed those infamous words asked by the early disciples of Jesus, “what must we do to do the works of God” in other words; give me a method, formula so that I can Velcro it to myself.
Please hear me, my heart, this is in no way an indictment of or against anyone of my siblings, always with the revealing of the heart comes copious amounts of healing, deliverance, restoration, reconciliation and so much more. There is one who does condemn the hidden undetected one in us all, in our flesh, the father of lies and religion; he alone is the accuser of the family of God.

Father brought such tremendous healing to my own life (heart) being a part of this reunion. The metronome of his heart beat that rhythmically sends forth the clear and distinct unforced rhythms of His grace is working powerfully where it appears that nothing is happening, in the desert of lives overcome with the fatigue and barrenness as a result of the religious cocktail of intoxication.

Rich

Motive and Intent

The intent and focus of our Father's heart and affections are addressed toward our need, and that need above all and everything else is to KNOW-EXPERIENCE His love, that is what we were recreated for.
To this end He ever works. His focus is pure, it is focused without any distractions. Its not our fears, our sense of shame or anything else that detour's Him from ever moving forward in this divine romance, wooing our cold lost hearts into the security and warmth of His forever loving heart.

His gaze is intense, it looks far past my faults/sins and sees my need, and that need is to KNOW some of the depth and intensity of His jealous love 4-me!!
This is the only thing that matters, coming to see that even my ability to respond to all and anything related to His love for me is but His grace actively working in me.

I am seeing ever more clearly that without Papa and His love for me, my life will be defined by something, I was created to be complete in having worth, value, significance, but that will only be possible as a result of experiencing His pure intense jealous love for me.
There are no vacuums, without knowing, experiencing daily His love, I will be either conformed to this worlds currency, performance based living, or I will be transformed into His likeness and image, and that option is totally possible only because of BEING Loved.

Rich