Calendar

LOVE AND TRUTH
LORD’S DAY, APRIL 9
Philippians 1:9-11

1 Corinthians 13:1-6

 

“…in knowledge and

in all judgment.”

 

LOVE AND TRUTH
 
When Paul prayed for the love of the Philippians to abound, it was “in knowledge and in all judgment” (Phil 1:9).
 
Yes, it is important to abound in love. Unfortunately, our understanding of love has been corrupted and tainted by this sinful world. If our love is misguided, if it is not based upon the truth of God’s Word but our own man-centred experiences, it can lead to disastrous consequences. That is why Paul prayed for their love to abound yet only “in knowledge and in all judgment” (Phil 1:9). Love must abound, but we must be careful that it is within the bounds of our knowledge of God and His Word. This knowledge is not just an intellectual understanding of the facts of Scripture. It is to have a full experiential knowledge of all that God has revealed to us. Truth and doctrine are just as important as our love and zeal.
 
We cannot love properly unless we have knowledge. Yet knowledge is useless if it is not tempered with love. As A.W. Pink wrote, “warmheartedness should be accompanied and directed by a well-instructed understanding, that they might have spiritual judgment which would cause them to weigh things and enable them to discriminate between the true and the false, that they might perceive what to love and what to hate, what to seek and what to shun.” The right measure of both will enable us to have such a discerning love – that “in all judgment,” we would have the godly wisdom to know between right and wrong, truth and error.
 
This is therefore how our love must be applied – based on knowledge and dispensed with discernment. It is not just a blind increase of misdirected love, or a proud pursuit of knowledge without application. It is a very careful Scriptural balance that one must have, and therefore it was something that Paul prayed for, and what we ought to pray for as well.
 
THOUGHT: “Love unites but doctrine divides” – what is wrong with this statement?
PRAYER: “And this I pray, that your (my) love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment.” (Phil 1:9)

Search