Question: "Should not we cease to emphasize our differences and unite in a spirit of love?"
Answer: "If we, supposedly in the name of love, so as not to trouble our neighbors, are going to keep quiet about their error and not explain to them that they are on a false path, then this is not love at all but hatred! Does he do well who, upon seeing a blind man approaching a precipice, does not tell him about it, so as not to 'trouble' him? Is that then love?"
This is very true. Being a college student I encounter this scenario daily. Although I am still young and still learning for myself, I see countless people I may call "friends" taking wrong turns in their lives. Most times I say nothing, which is my wrong doing, but other times I speak up and am condemned for it. But out of love I must say something, right?
ReplyDelete"If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. for whoever desires to save his own life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul??
ReplyDelete"Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him will I confess before my Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, him will I also deny before My Father who is in heaven."
Dear Brother,
ReplyDeleteI am most pleased to see that you have stated in your latest blog that it is not love to let someone go along their merry way in error and heresy but hatred. This is the exact problem with the Ecumenical Movement and the World Council of Churches (World Council of Antichrists and Heretics).
The Scriptures tell us clearly that love will cover a multitude of sins and that to lead one from error to truth will cover a multitude of sins. (James 5:19, 20; I Peter 4:8; Proverbs 10:12). Therefore, to lead one from error to truth is indeed love that covers a multitude of sins.
Our Lord Jesus Christ did not just "get along" with every whim of error and heresy in his day, hence they wanted him to be crucified. The Blessed Apostles did not just "get along" in the name of love with every false doctrine in their time, or else many of them would not be martyred. Let us not forget that even the last living Apostle, the Blessed St. John the Evangelist, the one who wrote on love the most, was the very same apostle who had to confront the heretic Celsus, who denied Christ's real incarnation and deity. When Celsus asked for the apostle John to recognize his authority as legitimate, the Blessed Apostle replied: "I recognize the firstborn of Satan." In fact, in another instance, when Celsus entered a bathhouse, which the Blessed Apostle John happened to be in, the Blessed Apostle ran out of the house and said: "Away, for the enemy of God has come!" Indeed, love does not tolerate error and hence is naturally repulsive to it.
Shame on many of the ecumenists and left-wing minded people within our Orthodox circles who neglect these truths. Even greater shame on those within the ranks of Orthodoxy as Bishops, Metropolitans, Archbishops and even Patriarchs who have done the same. To such, the True Church of God will pronounce: "Anathema! Maranatha!"
Yours in Christ,
Timothy Kwoh