Chapter 2|When Did Christians Stop Loving God?

“We cannot claim to love God whom we do not see if we do not love humans that we do see”

Recently, there was a discussion on a church WhatsApp group chat about our devotion to God. This debate could not have come at a more opportune time as I had been formulating a draft for what would eventually become this essay at the time. I had an open window into the thoughts of members of the congregation. Most commenters asserted that our church was strong in its love and service towards its Maker and that seemed like the end of the discussion. I can imagine many of them had that warm satisfied sensation in their belly. The kind one gets after a good meal.

I am grateful that the Lord is teaching me how to control my mouth; but in this instance, I just couldn’t keep it in. I told the church that our devotion to God is not what we think it is. I received requests to explain myself and I did do so to a few individuals whom I knew were not looking for a fight. The explanation is what I present here in this write-up.

What do you call a mechanic that doesn’t work with automobiles? Or apple juice that is not made out of apples but oranges? A human body without a heart? Thus, what do you call a Christian that does not love God? And when did we stop loving God? Both are vital questions that have been screaming out for answers in this century.

The church is getting carried away. We invest so much in fancy things and ideas and events for the sake of having events that we seem to have forgotten our first love. God should be our first love. He is our heart and focus. We say confidently that we love Him but how can we claim to love God if we do not love our fellow humans in deeds? Both are intertwined and form Christ’s command to love. As Christians, we tend to forget that love is the only command that was given to us.

I look around me and see no difference between a Christian and a non-Christian. As a young convert, I find it very discouraging that even pastors, teachers and other church leaders, the people I should be looking up to, are not loving others but are more concerned with themselves. Therefore, they are not loving God. They even preach the ‘you’ gospel.

“God will give you breakthrough. God will get you that job. God will give you success, God will bless you and your family. God will help you grow in the word. You, you, you…”

The church has become so individualistic and materialistic. We are each so consumed with our own personal lives and the push for success that the 21^st Century world is plagued with. The surge of individualism in the church can even be seen in our prayers. We pray very selfish prayers for ourselves, and sometimes for our families, but mostly it all about “me”. Again, we cannot claim to love God whom we do not see if we do not love humans that we do see[1]. It is amazing that this one criterion that defines the Christian life and the church as a family and the body of Christ is the one thing that many of us today are not doing or are simply blind to.

⁹ ‘As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰ If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹² My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. ¹³ Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. (John 15:9-13 NIVUK)

Growing up, I read the above verses over and over again, paying a millisecond of attention to them each time and the few times that I stared for more than a breath, I simply thought it all sounded sweet and made me feel warm and fuzzy inside. It’s not until recently that my heart has been opened to it and I see that if I’m not loving others regardless of my personal history with a particular person or any other hindrance, I am not keeping God’s commandment.

The kind of love we are called to is not simply saying “I love you” to people or helping someone carry a heavy shopping bag. Those are good things; but in John 15:13, Jesus Christ goes further to explain the love he demands from us, the same love he showed us: He considered His life worthless for us and He proved this great love to us by dying in our stead.

Dear reader, in this Christ-like love, I am nothing while you are everything. Even you that I don’t get on with and you that wishes me dead – I cannot call myself a Christian and say I love God if I don’t love you. As a Christian, I am to love God sacrificially and love everyone sacrificially in all I do. I am to love you just as Christ loves me.

Oh! How He loves me! God, the Creator the source of all life, the One who is before everything was, is and will be. God died for me.  He died for me who caused Him so much pain. God suffered scorn and died for me. Even after all that, I continue to spit in my Lover’s face and reject the divine embrace; yet I am loved. Amazing love! How can it be that thou, my God, shouldst die for me? It’s the day after Easter Monday and the awareness of the sacrifice and subsequent glorious resurrection of Jesus is still raw. How I wish my psyche and soul could always be in tune with this fact regardless of the season.

Our salvation is a personal experience. Our heart transplant is tailored to us. So, it is unsurprising that we take up a self-concerned approach to our Christianity. This is not a modern 21st Century problem. This struggle to love affected even the early Christians. That’s why the apostle John felt compelled to write his epistles and why Paul admonishes the Corinthian church for their lack of love:

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. ⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. (1 Corinthians 13:4-8 NIVUK)

1 Corinthians 13 is not a romantic wedding reading that aims to make people give tearful smiles. It is the description of love in practice and anything short of 1 Corinthians 13 is not love. It is easy to read this and be self-confident. Once I was visiting a particular church where the pastor shared with us an exercise to do when reading the above passage. He told us to replace love with our names:

Moji is patient, Moji is kind. Moji does not envy, Moji does not boast, Moji is not proud.

Just from verse 4 alone I know that I am struggling with love. I may be kind but I am most definitely not patient and I am rather envious. Reading this passage this way just now has brought me to tears. I am not saying this to be melodramatic or to shock you into action in anyway like the performances some preachers give. I’m saying it as a fact. Tears are actually running down my face and I am breathing heavily.

I do not love you and so I cannot claim to love God and this breaks my heart. All I want to do is love and please God but I cannot say I do because I don’t love my fellow humans whom I see, not to talk of Someone I do not see. I want to love you and God unapologetically without shame or fear of consequence. Still, I do thank God for the Holy Spirit who lives in me and is transforming me day by day, building me up in the image of precious loving Jesus Christ.

Some churches do preach selfless love and their members understand it. Nevertheless, we don’t see it in action. There is still that underlying coldness and indifference in church. We cannot claim to love our fellow human beings if we don’t show it in our selfless deeds. It is absolutely essential to note that love is proactive that’s why Paul in his first letter to the Thessalonians refers to “the labour prompted by love”[2]. Love is not love unless it is shown in visible actions:

¹⁷If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? ¹⁸Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. (1 John 3:17-18 NIVUK)

¹⁵ Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. ¹⁶ If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? (James 2:15-16 NIVUK)

We know all this. We read it all in the Bible time and time again but why don’t we see? Why are we so docile and unchanged? Sadly, I can give a number of instances where the above has happened among Christians. For example, we see someone battling to pay their rent, we pray for them and tell them to have faith that God will provide, and that’s it. We do nothing even though between us, as a congregation, we can pay that rent for more than a year.

Love is bold. There’s nothing like ‘mind your own business’. Your business is my business and my business is not mine at all but yours. This audaciousness of love is not for gossip, to spite a person or to feel better about one’s self. It is solely for the sake of the other person’s joy and comfort, and ultimately the salvation and spiritual growth of the person.

People often make the mistake that to act love, they have to have that warm feeling in their hearts. However, love is more than a chemical reaction that one just experiences. It is a continued act of selflessness even when the emotions are not there. It is a decision a Christian makes that regardless of the actions or silence of everyone else around, “I will love others with my whole heart”. In fact, wouldn’t it be nice if we used the word ‘love’ only in reference to our vertical worship of God and horizontal service to our fellow human beings, not for romantic emotions or to express fondness for a particular object or idea? Just solely for the things of God. Perhaps we would truly understand its gravity.

It is my prayer that we as Christians love and that we don’t reserve it for brothers and sisters in Christ alone but we show it with boldness to everyone. To the agnostic next-door neighbour, the Muslim shopkeeper that sells you a mobile recharge card, the animist that offers you tomatoes, and the atheist lecturer. To the prisoner, the person who stole your phone, the horrid dictator, and the armed robber who killed your father. If God, the Creator of the universe, became human and died for all, if that same God truly lives in us, we can selflessly love all.

[1] 1 John 4:20

[2] 1 Thessalonians 1:3