TESTIMONY

Every Christian has a testimony. Each individual is a magnificent, unique, spectacular creation of God. Each life has worth and value. The events that shaped and molded you are interesting. The way that God reached you with His love is exciting and you have a story to tell.

Tell your story often and in as excellent and interesting a manner as possible. Reject the lie of the evil one that your story is not interesting or edifying or worthy of telling. It is interesting - it is an adventure with Jesus. It is edifying - it is the story of a great victory of our King. It is worthy of telling - God has decreed you worthy of life and redemption.

Outline your story. Ask the Lord to show you the things to share and the things to keep private. Write it out. Make a short version and a longer one for various occasions. Include in your story enough of the gospel, the good news of Jesus, that if your hearer never heard another message the rest of his life, he would know how to be saved. He would know from your story that God's heart is towards him in love and that Jesus paid the price for him, just like He did for you.

So many times Christians have an appointment to share God's love and they think, "Oh, what will I say?". Say whatever the Lord tells you to say, and if He says "O.K.," tell your personal story - give your testimony. This way you will never be in a situation with nothing to say, unless God tells you to be silent.

Your personal testimony can be a powerful, exciting and effective instrument for our Lord to use. Do not look down on it. Hone it. Sharpen it. Plug in the right Scriptures. And use it to the glory of God.

However, this chapter on testimonies is about a different kind of testimony - an even better testimony.

This greater testimony is the means by which all men will know that you are a disciple of Jesus, a follower of Jesus, a son of the Kingdom, a new creature. The greater testimony is love.

This is a new command, a new order, a new directive. It is not optional for disciples. Followers of the Way have no choice about responding to this. We are under orders. We do not have the choice to obey the command or reject it. This is our King Who is speaking.

If you are not in the place of subjection to the King, you probably should do something else instead of reading the rest of this book. It will offend you terribly. I'm surprised you got this far and are still reading. If this is where you are, please carefully examine the claims Jesus made and settle once and for all the question of who is in charge of your life.

If you go on and try to do the things of God on your own, it will be a real mess. You can love people because you're good, and they're good and it's the right thing to do, but when you do it that way it smells funny. Bad things happen.

Wise Solomon said, "The way of the Lord is a refuge for the righteous, but it is the ruin of those who do evil." Prov. 10:29. Hosea said it this way: "The ways of the Lord are right; the righteous walk in them, but the rebellious stumble in them." Hosea 14:9.

Therefore get righteous. Get right with God, and then walk in His ways. Then walk in The Way which is Jesus.

Our word love is too big. It carries with it too many ideas and concepts. It's difficult to know what we mean when we speak with each other about love.

In the Greek language, in which the New Testament was written, there are three basic words for love, three Greek words translated as "love". It is helpful for us to see the distinction between the types of love, and to get a clear handle on what Jesus was talking about.

EROS. Our word "erotic" comes from this word. It is sexual attraction, sexual love. The strong, powerful feelings of passion and desire are EROS love. God made us sexual people, and He provided the institution of marriage for the fulfillment of this beautiful expression of love. EROS is a love that is primarily centered in our bodies. This is not the word used in John 13.

PHILEO. This word for love denotes affection for someone or liking someone. We've all heard various expressions about how we have to love each other, but we don't have to like each other. Using the Greek words this expression is, "I have to AGAPE love you, but I don't have to PHILEO love you." I suspect that the origins of this selfish, legalistic statement are rooted in the evil one. By the letter of the law, this is true, but remember what kills and what gives life.

This friendship type of love, liking another, enjoying the company of another, is PHILEO love. Friends are wonderful love gifts from God. It is a love gift from God that we are made to experience PHILEO kind of love. To share experiences, philosophies, music, adventures, together with a friend is beautiful. PHILEO is a love primarily centered in our Souls.

Jesus had PHILEO love for His disciples. He told them in John 15 that He no longer called them servants, but friends. The fellowship, the friendship, the camaraderie between Jesus and His disciples must have been tremendous. The singing, the laughter, the discussions in the evenings, the exciting adventures, the hard times, the good times, they shared it together as Master/servants, but also as Friend/friends.

Since Jesus said to love "as I have loved you," this PHILEO love, this friendship would be a part of it. But, this is not the word used in John 13.

AGAPE. AGAPE love is a commitment to love. AGAPE is a setting of the will to do what is needed for another. AGAPE is other-centered. AGAPE is godly. AGAPE is the love of John 13. God is love. God is AGAPE love.

God so loved the world... God so AGAPED the world... This love is the response of God to the need of man. God set His heart to provide a way, The Way, for man to be restored to the family of God. God made a covenant, a contract to be signed in blood, that He would forgive, that He would have mercy, that He would provide salvation.

This love of God is in response to the heart of God in spite of the evil of man.

When Adam disobeyed God and opened the door for sin, He died. He was destroyed. The image within changed. He became different. His inner man was corrupted. This vessel, created to contain the image of his Creator, was broken. It now leaked, and there was an evil one who was always ready to fill this vessel with the most wretched things imaginable.

To our way of thinking, this was not so obvious in Adam and Eve, but it was clear in their son Cain. God, however, saw the wretchedness at once and in all people. Man was no longer fit for fellowship with God without a new nature, a new heart. AGAPE love is God's determination to provide the new nature.

When we look at the wretchedness of people without a veneer of goodness, or without the new nature, we are repulsed. When we see displayed on our TVs the brutal massacre of women and children most of us are incensed. When we think of pornography, especially child pornography, and the destruction of young lives for profit, there erupts in our minds murder, vengeance and retribution.

The world is full of rapists, muggers, thieves, liars, killers, extortioners, and rebels. Many are overt. Multitudes are covert. When we no longer just look at this, but really see it, we experience shock and revulsion. A greater shock comes when we realize, I too, have these inclinations. My old heart is just like that.

Some have responded to this wretchedness of man, and fear of self-debasement, by entering religious institutions of isolation. Some isolate themselves through television, books, movies and videos not realizing that the seeds being sown in their minds are alive and germinating. Some hide in mental fortresses of dehumanizing and non-responsible philosophies and cults. Many make the mistake of trying to destroy themselves by slow or fast suicide in a variety of methods.

Almost all people respond with some kind of pride and self-justification. "Thank You God that I'm not like that." Another way to say this same Pharisaical statement in a more religious way, a more acceptable way is, "There but by the grace of God go I." How sweet. How sick.

Grace is love I don't deserve. I thank God for His grace. "Thank You God." I thank Him that I have been given grace, and I am not like the other ugly one. "Thank You God that I'm not like that." You see it's really the same thing. We may think that the one way is a nice religious way to separate ourselves from the ugliness of others, but God sees it as evidence that the leaky vessel leaked some more and the evil one is motivating us.

Religion separates itself from the ugliness of sin with phony phrases. "There but by the grace of God go I" builds a wall of non-involvement, unconcern, irresponsibility, self-righteous indignation. God's response to sin is different.

God responded to this wretchedness with AGAPE love. He kept His contract, and signed it in the blood of Jesus at the Cross of Calvary. He Himself paid the price. He Himself provided the sacrifice that would break and destroy the evil hold on His creation. He Himself came and took upon Him flesh. "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us." He found a way to fulfill His justice and holiness and not separate Himself from us.

He became sin for us. The AGAPE love gift to the world was that He Himself became the offender. He Himself became the pornographer, even the child pornographer. He Himself became the butcher of innocent women and children. He Himself became the rebel, the killer, the thief, the adulterer. He became sin for us.

"God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." 2 Cor.5:21. This is the AGAPE response of God according to His covenant, His contract to save us. When religion separates from the ugliness of sin, the AGAPE love of God joins Jesus with sin.

"But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Rom. 5:8. "While we were still sinners" is a shocking statement. God hates sin and God hates sinners!

I know you've heard, "God hates sin, but He loves the sinner." This is a nice religious statement, but it's wrong. "You hate all who do wrong." Ps.5:5.

If you want to see the hatred of God for sinners, look at the cross. See the bloodied, mangled body of His own Son who became the sinner. That's what God thinks of sinners. He hates and despises them. He kills them. He destroys them.

He loves you and me with an AGAPE love that has provided a way to relate to God as children, as righteous, as washed and forgiven. Don't ever try to relate to God as just a poor humble sinner. When you feel like that, or you are convicted of some sin, run to the cross. Get washed in the blood. Put off the old, put on the new. Reckon yourself dead to sin, and alive to God. But, don't try to relate to God as a sinner.

Jesus related to God as a sinner for you. Because of this AGAPE love, you don't have to relate to God like that.

If you did have to relate to God as a sinner, then the place for you is hell. Your place is to be forsaken, destroyed and forever banned from the presence of a holy God. God loved you, AGAPED you so much that you don't have to relate to God as a sinner, but as a child of His. This is the great salvation.

AGAPE love sets the value on the object of its love. Our worth in the eyes of God is so high He gave Jesus for us. Jesus prayed that we might know that Father loves us just as He loves Jesus. We are of incredible value to God. The price He paid proves it. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," AGAPE love is in the heart of the lover.

It is like the man who searched far and wide for a certain antique car. He found it in an old barn, full of rust, brokenness, and disrepair. After full service as an automobile, it had served as a training tool for child-mechanics, a work-bench, a chicken-roost, and a depository of junk and trash.

It hardly resembled an auto. It was rusted, broken, falling-apart, and filthy. It was beautiful and magnificent, a treasure of indescribable beauty to the man. The value was great.

The restoration process was begun with painstaking love, concern, joy, and faithfulness according to the value in the heart of the owner. The restoration process in our lives is being carried on with the same AGAPE love of God.

AGAPE love is so set on doing what is right and needed for the beloved, the lover becomes vulnerable. AGAPE love is vulnerable love.

AGAPE love is faithful. The evil one offered Jesus everything that motivates and captures men. Jesus proved faithful because of AGAPE love. He set His heart to follow Father. He set His heart to not waiver or fall. He did not give in to any temptation that would deter Him from His AGAPE course, no matter what He felt like.

"As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem." Luke 9:51. Some translations say, "He set his face to go to Jerusalem." AGAPE love is faithful to pursue the objective of its love no matter what the feelings are. His agony in the garden showed that He did not want to go to the cross, He did not feel like going to the cross, but He willed to do our Father's will because of AGAPE love.

On that last night before His death, after they ate the Covenant Meal, Jesus prayed the awesome prayer recorded in John 17. In it He said, "I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do." AGAPE love finishes the course. AGAPE love is faithful. AGAPE love is loyal.

If I am to love you as Jesus loves me, then the characteristics of this same AGAPE love must be manifest in our relationship - they must be manifest from me to you, no matter what comes back from you to me.

First I must commit myself to love you. I must make a decision to love you. I must covenant, contract, seal my heart to AGAPE you. Never mind feelings. Never mind emotions. Never mind protecting myself from getting hurt. This is a commitment to love that responds to Jesus in me, not to any certain quality in you.

This AGAPE faithfulness from commitment is the key to all righteous relationships. The basis is faithful Jesus living and reigning within - not circumstances, personality or feelings. This is especially true of marriage, the picture God uses to illustrate His relationship with us.

AGAPE love is strong enough to provide an environment where EROS can flourish. EROS is fickle, and unable to sustain a marriage by itself. AGAPE is true and creates a setting where EROS can flourish according to the design of Him who made us.

In marriage and in other relationships, AGAPE love commits itself to love, to do what is right, to do what is best for the loved one. AGAPE love is not stupid, it knows what is best.

AGAPE love submits to God. It is, like Jesus, submitted to what God says and not feelings or self-direction.

For example a brother may want to get together to talk and pray because of some pressing problem. I may have a pretty good idea of the issue, and an excellent solution for the problem as I see it. I also remember the words of a sales trainer during Seminary days when selling Bibles door to door, "Try to overcome objections before they're raised. Answer questions before they're asked."

So my natural inclination is to dispense the answers and not spend the huge amount of time that could be required listening. This appeals to my mind. It "feels good". It seems like good stewardship of time. I won't have to get as deeply involved. HOWEVER;

God says in Prov. 18:13, "He who answers before listening - that is his folly and his shame."

AGAPE love requires that I hear him out. I allow my brother to share his heart as fully as he wants. The only restriction on this would be an interruption by God or a higher priority demanding that time. What "feels right," or appeals to my senses must submit to the Word of God.

AGAPE love requires me to not separate from you. "There but by the grace of God go I" is not acceptable. I must follow the pattern of Jesus.

The one with the strange teaching I cannot tolerate is still my brother. The broken "wino" sleeping in the gutter is not a thing of disgust. He is my brother, and if not really my brother, he is still included in Jesus' statement about "unto me." The Sodomite who is bringing God's curse upon this land is my brother.

(Besides, it's us Christians and our lack of being salt and light that has allowed corruption and darkness to invade the land. We also are the only ones with the authority to apply the curse-breaking blood of Jesus that alone can cleanse the land.)

"We love because he first loved us." 1 John 4:19. AGAPE love responds to the love of God which came first. It does not have to be loved by another person before it can love the other. The first to love was God. He loved us. Now we respond to God's love by loving another. The basis is God's love, not that the other person loves us, or responds to God's love through us.

We are to love the brothers and sisters of our Lord as if they were already clean. This is not an "as if" since they are clean through the word that Jesus has spoken. We are not called on to condemn others.

Thank You Lord.

There are enough voices condemning and accusing already. No one needs another accuser. The enemy has enough willing servants without our help. He accuses the brothers. He condemns. He gets people to even accuse and condemn themselves.

AGAPE love is careful about truth. It puts away lies and falsehood. It does not pretend or tell lies no matter what color they are. A person who loves you with AGAPE love can be relied upon to tell you the truth. He can also be relied upon to not beat you with the truth.

I hate it when someone uses the truth to club me over the head. We all err. We all make mistakes. We all are in need of correction at various times. How wonderful it is when the rebuke or correction comes with love, gentleness, and a desire to see us grow up. How redemptive it is when there is no broadcasting the truth to gain an advantage over another.

Thank God for the AGAPE lovers who cover a multitude of sins. For those whose love is so perfect, so Christ-like, that it has cast out fear.

Let me tell you a true story of the power of love to break barriers.

My entire theological orientation was in an anti-Catholic mode. Not catholic meaning universal, but anti-Roman Catholic. We would study, "They teach...(Roman Catholic); the Bible teaches..." I got frozen in a 450 year old controversy that locked me in a time-warp. I became negative towards Roman Catholics. As part of my ordination I had to vow that "’The Papacy is the Anti-Christ’ is a true and correct interpretation of Scripture."

I began the ministry in a mission. Door-to-door was the name of the game. I was careful about not "sheep-stealing," or receiving a Christian into our congregation who was a member of another Christian congregation. Even encouraging them to think about changing fellowships was a no-no. However, every Roman Catholic was fair game.

If you could win a Roman Catholic that was O.K. You just got a real prize. More power to you. Keep up the good work.

After three years, we built a new building and were doing well. During that summer I got a phone call from the Roman Catholic congregation asking if they could come by and make a presentation. I felt trapped and mouthed some words. They said it would only take a few minutes, and I reluctantly agreed.

About twenty minutes later two Nuns, several lay-teachers, and about 100 children from the third and fourth grades came marching into our Sanctuary. I thought those Penguins (forgive me Lord) would desecrate the place. (I wonder what the comparison is between Old Testament High Places and our "Church" Buildings.")

The children began to speak. This is the way I remember it. They spoke one at a time and said: "We are studying the Bible in Vacation Bible School." (What kind of nonsense is this? Roman Catholics don't teach the Bible. They don't have Bible Schools.) "We are studying about love and unity. Because we are all Christians we want to give you this Banner as an expression of our love and the fact that we are one in Jesus." (Explosions began going off inside something like Hiroshima.)

At this point several children unrolled a large butcher-paper collage about thirty feet long. On the paper were pictures and drawings of every-day activities. There were homes, schools, hospitals, cars, "churches," factories, businesses, etc. etc. They said, "Christians are people who are forgiven by Jesus. We love Him and show that love by the way we live our every-day lives at home, in school, at work and play. We love you and want to give this to you."

I don't recall how soon I began to cry, but tears come to my eyes now just remembering this beautiful, freeing experience some twenty years ago.

This is the greater testimony. This is the testimony by which all know that you are a disciple of Jesus.

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