When I tell you that I love you what have I created, furthered, promised or manipulated? We would inherently assume that hearing from a pastor that he loves everyone would be received with understanding, edification and clarity. However, each person has their own perspective, and many possess filters, some unhealthy wounds through which this adherence to God’s Principles of loving Christ’s Body is somehow misinterpreted or redirected to fulfill some internal drive, yearning or expectation of romantic proportions. God told me to love everyone, He didn’t tell me to say it to people so that their emotional requirement to hear that fulfills some unmet need for validation or romantic pursuance.
I am speaking to those many out there who do not understand the purity of Christ’s Love for you. He died that you may be set free from an enemy over which you had no control but the gift of Grace God has offered to all men. We are not vulnerable to attacks of this enemy having invited the Holy Spirit to reside in our hearts. This love is beyond anything that I can even imagine in my male pursuit for a mate. Therefore, pursuing the understanding of how God Loves and subsequent love from a Pastor to the Flock, even a mate would benefit enormously from the transition to man-centered understanding and potential ungodly pursuits with a Pastor’s own wicked fleshly heart. A Pastor must kneel before God before he may stand before a wife proclaiming undying love.
We are new creatures no longer simple subjects to the gods of this world even with regard to love. When Pastor’s forget this they become arrogant and foolish holding closed door meetings with members of the opposite sex believing themselves somehow risen above the testing of their own souls. There is no hierarchy in the Christian Church, no man is given more of the Spirit of God than any other and thus all men must be vigilant, diligent and sober minded to defense against the potential for lapses, falls and sin.
This requires, demands that when a Pastor is considering a romantic love leading to discussion of marriage that he love with God’s Love, putting aside his own predilection to foolish action, embraced by the flesh. There must be special regard to dedication in purity and no false proclamation of love or the potential thereof which may subject a woman whom God loves completely to the deception of a man. Let’s face it Adam blamed his disobedience first upon Eve and then upon God Himself. The mistakes made in my life are mine alone and so the departure from making those mistakes is also mine. The anointing must come first and in that anointing a willingness no even dedication to doing the right thing for all those in the Body, especially one who shares the potential for a healthy marriage. I am not beyond the errors of man and stand diligently against my own propensity to make sinful mistakes when not armored by God’s Holy Spirit against them.
I crave a life walked within proximity to the Holy Spirit. Departure for even a moment in manly confidence is opening avenue for access by the enemy’s deceptive power under any authority given him by God. I saw Job tested, a man who had by sight done nothing wrong and this led in my view to the only mistake he made, believing his own righteousness sufficient before God. God does not tempt me but He sure does use this world and my own tendencies to put me in situations that will test and consequently sanctify me by the power of battle bruises. Any of us who is serious in their Christian determination would agree that it is typically ourselves, our expectations, attitudes and dalliances that lead us directly into the most effective lessons. Therefore, the key is walking with the Spirit, IN the Spirit, consciously for as long as it may be maintained and even beyond through Spirit’s miraculous participation in our walk of sanctification.
So, is there ever going to be a marriage for this Pastor. Possibly, God willing and God’s Planning would have to create that union. For my part I must honor all women as His Daughter’s, not unique, all unique. That requires demands that until such time as a marriage is indicated by God’s Holy Spirit that I remand myself to offering and accepting the love of God with each of you. To do otherwise is deceptive, foolish and unloving. So, when I tell you I love you that what it means that God has filled me, washed me, adopted me, anointed me, provisioned and protected me to utilize His gifting to support, edify and encourage you to fulfill His design for your Life in bringing honor, glory and praise to His Holy Name. That is what He wants of me, that is what you want of me. Anything else will be revealed by His direction in His Timing for His Glory. I will not force, deceive nor participate in my own departures from that understanding. No matter how much my flesh says otherwise, for it like the enemy are no longer in Control of my Eternal Life Reborn.