Let Love
There are some things in life one has to allow before it will happen. Some things require letting them happen. If you have an indoor pet, the only way it can go outside is if you let it. After all, that is what the word let means. It means not to prevent or forbid. It means to allow.
As believers in Jesus, love wants to express itself toward others through us. But for it to be highly effective, it must be allowed to do so untainted.
Romans 12:9 Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good.
Here, it says, “Let love.” Allow it to be ministered to another without hypocrisy. In other words, it needs to be sincere, which means it should not be offered with any hooks. Love in action is not offered to make another person beholding. Love is to be offered freely according to its true nature and quality.
Love is full of hypocrisy if it comes with an “I’ll scratch your back, and you scratch mine” mentality and expectation. We are to let love express itself as it is, not based on what we can get out of it.
A primary characteristic of love is a desire to give of oneself to benefit others. It is to be used in a way that causes advancement, encouragement, strengthening, blessing, or well-being to another.
Part of the process of letting love be love will lead you to abhor evil. To abhor something is to detest it utterly. To have no appreciation for it.
When many think of evil, they associate it mainly with extreme bad behavior. Wrong behavior habitually practiced and executed at extreme levels is evil.
Philippians 3:2 Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the mutilation!
Here, we find that those who rallied to make the Gentiles to be circumcised and obey the law of Moses were deemed evil workers.
However, that is not the only definition of evil.
Hebrews 3:12 Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God;
What does it mean to depart from the Living God? It means to leave behind what He says is necessary for a relationship with Him. It means to look to our own devices for salvation, justification, and sanctification. It is to do things our way while imagining He is required to be impressed with us. It is moving away from knowing His will and desires to only yielding to our own.
An evil heart of unbelief will look to things other than Him for what is needed and will refuse to yield to the Holy Spirit for the benefit of others, thinking that He exists only to prosper themselves. This is why we are told to let love be without hypocrisy. I encourage you today to let love be love.
