but the Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his steadfast love. - Psalm 147: 11 (ESV)
"God loves me unconditionally and He is pleased with me" declares the latest Facebook update from Joyce Meyer Ministries; promoting the release of her new book. A renowned false teacher, Meyer unashamedly sells the scratching that itching ears desire so much. A word faith and prosperity heretic, Meyers is famous for quotes like this that generate a plethora of amens and confusion throughout the Body of Christ. This quote today, which again is being used to promote book sales not actual Christian discipleship, is at the heart of a lot of common false teaching today. It is consistent thread throughout the hyper-grace preaching founded by Joseph Prince. It is also prevalent in the preaching of many seeker friendly, purpose driven churches. It takes something that is so pure, like the love of God, and defiles it so badly to mislead people. Let's take a look at exactly how.
The notion of the unconditional love of God is both true and untrue. How can that be? Well it depends on how you are using it. It depends on what context you are standing. God's love is always initiative in nature. That means it starts with Him. It is not a reactive in nature. Meaning there is nothing we can do, to elicit the love of God.
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die-- but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. - Romans 5: 6-8 (ESV)
This is the unconditional love of God in action. This is the epitome of it. That while we were still in complete rebellion to Him - He sacrificed His only Son to reconcile us back to Him. Oh beloved, preach this unconditional love from the rooftops and scream it to the four corners of the world! This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ!
But do not add to it! Do not then take into contextual areas it does not belong in. Do not do what Joyce Meyers and Joseph Prince do. We must be steadfast to not pervert the love of God and make it about us. That is the problem with the advertisement from Meyer. She had a chance to stop after expressing the unconditional love of God and maybe even tie it back to the cross but she didn't. None of the seeker friendly pastors do. They'll talk about the love of God but to get into the blood and the cross requires an honest discussion of our sin and need to repent. That doesn't test market well in the focus groups. The problem with the advertisement is that it uses the unconditional love of God to reach the true goal and selling point - that God is just pleased as punch with everything we do. That is what scratches the itching ears. That is what Meyer preaches day in and day out. That is what drives the hyper-grace bus. No one wants to hear they are a sinner. They all want to hear that they are great. The gospel according to me. The gospel that serves me. The gospel that is about me.
Beloved, today's deep theology is this - God is not pleased with us all the time. I would venture that He is probably displeased with us more than He is pleased. He shows great restraint and mercy, praise His name! The key verse clearly states that He is pleased with those that fear Him. Good luck hearing Joyce Meyers preach on needing to have a healthy fear of the Lord! Just read the Old Testament. Israel is the apple of His eye and He is displeased with them 75% of the time. He was so displeased with them He allowed them to be scattered by the Assyrians and taken into captivity by the Babylonians! I can hear the cries already from the false teachers - we are under grace! Yes we are but grace is not a license to sin. Grace does not remove the Old Testament from relevance. That is what is so insidious about preachers like Joseph Prince. He takes such a core concept for us as believers, grace, and warps it into eliminating portions of the Bible. As if God nullified His own Word because of His grace. But since the deception runs so deep, let us look at New Testament proof:
For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play." We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. - 1Corinthians 10: 1-12 (ESV)
Paul is writing to the Church at Corinth warning them about their behaviors. Warning them about their propensity to take the grace of God and treat it so cheaply that they fell back into sin. He uses the Old Testament examples - completely debunking this foolish notion that because we are under grace the Old Testament somehow means less to us. Look at what the Apostle is saying to us here! He is recounting all of the blessings God provided for the Israelites. Under the cloud of God. Passed through the Red Sea. Manna and water from the rock. NEVERTHELESS - God was not pleased with most of them. Even blessings are not an indication that God is pleased with us! Idolaters, sexual immorality, complainers. We must not put Christ to the test beloved! These things were written down by God for our benefit! For our instruction! Take heed if we are so braggadocios to boast in our standing, lest we fall.
That again, really is the problem with this type of teaching. It is rife with the arrogance of man. It takes verses imploring us to work out our salvation with fear and trembling and dismisses them out of hand. Grace, grace, grace. Hallelujah, pass the offering plate. Then the people who accept this teaching have to go back to their lives. Their flesh. The enemy to their souls, prowling around. Then they may cheat or lie or steal because after all - God is pleased with me anyway. Suddenly that harmless flirtation wrecks a marriage and the adulterer has been taught that even in his adultery - God is pleased with him. Beloved, these Corinthian verses were written under divine inspiration to believers. They were written to us. God loves us with an unconditional love because He is God - not because of anything we have ever done. If He gave us what we deserved - we would all end up in hell. But God is most certainly not pleased when we sin. He not pleased when we show no love or compassion towards people. He is not pleased when we make our religion about blessing the saved instead of reaching the lost.
The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear Him. Those that hold reverence for Him. I have heard the tortured arguments offered by those who are already victims of these modern deceptions. They say, why do you want to serve a God who you have to fear? My answer is always the same. I am not fearful that God is going to strike me dead with a lighting bolt. I am afraid of forgetting He can if He so desires. That I would lose respect for His sovereignty. That I would take something so crucial for our salvation like His great grace an pervert it into an excuse to sin. That I would take something like His unconditional love and pervert it into having something to do with me. Don't follow the Joyce Meyer's of the world. She is selling books. To do so, she reduces the Gospel to the lowest common denominator. To what sounds good to our flesh. I can assure you of one thing based upon the Bible - God is not pleased.
Rev. Anthony
