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RHM Newsletter: Love and Hate from Refreshing Hope Ministries on Vimeo.

(1 Corinthians 13:1-3 NASB) If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

Thank you so much for being a part of Refreshing Hope Ministries and reading our devotional. I hope that this message finds you blessed, healthy, and happy wherever you are. There is great division in the United States today, and people are trying to divide us and categorize us by the color of our skin. Along with racism, I see wickedness in high places, abuse of authority, and bullies in riot gear cracking the skulls of harmless people. There is division and hate across the nation that needs to be addressed.

We are asked at RHM on where we stand, so here is my take on it:

* To the peaceful protestors: I say “We are with you! You are right! You have been wronged and this needs to be fixed! I hear you, I see what is happening, and I support you. Be encouraged!”

* To those looting stores and instigating violence: I say “You are not helping the cause and you are giving the movement a bad name.”

* To the good peace officers caught in bad situations: I say “We need more like you. You are appreciated. You are our front line of defense against injustice. Please stand up for the truth, defend the defenseless, for there is nothing is hidden that will not be made known.”

* To the bullies tear gassing peaceful protestors, shooting reporters with projectiles, kneeling on people’s neck until they suffocate, and shoving down peaceful old men who are trying to hand you a dropped badge, I have to say “You have proved without a shadow of a doubt that the protestors are right on the excessive use of force, and you did it on video so the whole world could see for themselves for generations to come. Remember this, man may not hold you accountable, but God will. One day you will stand before His throne while your life is replayed before you, and judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy (James 2:13 NASB). 

Jesus wept when He came to the tomb of Lazarus. John 11:35 is the shortest verse in the Bible, yet it gives us a deep look at the compassion Jesus Christ has for people. Today I want to talk about love, hate, racism, and where the Lord Jesus Christ stands on these issues. I feel that things have become clouded and everyone is yelling that He is on their side. They want to use Him as a tool, but He doesn’t work that way. Instead we need to check that we are still on His side, or we may find ourself fighting against God.

On the night that Jesus was betrayed, when they were having supper in the upper room, His last night with the twelve Apostles He had trained, Jesus told them this:

(John 13:34–35 NKJV)  A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Selah. Jesus knew that He would be crucified soon and great distress, fear, and confusion would come on the Apostles left behind. “The Way” as the church was called then (Acts 9:2), became hated and hunted. They were unjustly arrested, tortured, beaten, imprisoned, and put to death, whenever they were found by the authorities (Acts 26:10-11). Jesus knew they would never make it without a strong love for each other.

Prejudice and racism is not a recent thing. As the gospel began to spread, the first church became a melting pot of cultures and peoples. There were Jews, Gentiles (Non-Jews), Greeks, Romans, Ethiopians, Europeans, people from all walks of life. At first, Jews called Gentiles half-breeds, and the Gentiles returned the favor. They despised one another.

One day the Apostle Peter was praying on a rooftop terrace when he fell into a trance and had a vision. It would take a lot of words to tell the whole story, so I am going to summarize it for you. You can read the full version in Acts chapter 10. An angel appeared to a Roman Gentile, a centurion who was not a Christian nor saved, and he told him to send to Joppa for Peter who had a message that would save his household. Yet Peter, who was a Jew, would not even enter the house of a half-breed Gentile, so God prepared Peter before the men arrived. He put Peter in a trance and told him this three times:

(Acts 10:15 NIV) “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”

What this means is that when God accepts people, His followers are to accept them. If God has made them clean, then they are clean, and if you call them otherwise then you are in error and no longer on His side. At first Peter did not know what the vision meant, but immediately three men came to his house to take him to Cornelius.

(Acts 10:27–28 NKJV)  And as he talked with him, he went in and found many who had come together. Then he said to them, “You know how unlawful it is for a Jewish man to keep company with or go to one of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean.

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(Acts 10:34–35 NKJV)  Then Peter opened his mouth and said: “In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality. But in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him.

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(Acts 10:44–45 NKJV)  While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also.

The Holy Spirit fell on all the Gentiles listening to the Peter just as He had on the disciples at the beginning. God made no distinction between them. God loves all races and they are equal in His sight. Think about this, there are about 350 recognized dog breeds in the world in various colors. Why would you think that God would love one color more than another, if He created them all? All life came from Him, all life is precious, and not even a sparrow falls to the ground with Him knowing it (Matthew 10:29).

If we want to represent Jesus Christ on the Earth, how did Jesus tell us to do it? To love one another. In this way ALL men will KNOW that you are My disciples. They won’t have to ask. John put it this way:

(1 John 3:14–15 NKJV)  We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death. Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.

(1 John 4:20–21 NKJV)  If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.

Don’t try and put Jesus in your hate group for it is never going to work. If you believe Jesus has told you to cause harm to someone else, you have been deceived, and the voice that you are listening to is actually from satan, for Jesus will never support hate. He told the Pharisees who hated Him and plotted to kill Him this:

(John 8:44 NASB)  “You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him.

In the scripture above, John said that anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and murderers want to do the desires of their father, the devil. Isn’t that interesting? They unknowingly want to do the desires of their father, which are commands being sent to them. The real battle today is happening in the invisible spirit realm above us.

(Ephesians 6:11–12 NASB)  Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Angels battle in the heavens above us and the enemy stirs his people to action. The people down here hating, murdering, and abusing others, are acting on instructions given to them from the spirit realm, to stir up and add to the chaos. There is a move of God coming, and satan would love the human race to kill each other until we were extinct if it were possible. People are being used as puppets by the spiritual forces waging war in the heavenly places. If God’s people go to prayer and bring down the spiritual strongholds working behind the scenes, then victory will come. Bind the spirits of wickedness over our nation. 

Don’t get pulled into hating others as so many others have. Jesus told us to love one another, for love is the complete fulfillment of the law of God. It wraps all the commandments into one. The Apostle Paul wrote it this way:

(Romans 13:8–10 NKJV)  Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

Choose your father: Jesus said love. El diablo says hate. As for me and my house, we choose the Lord Jesus Christ. You can pray this with me if you like:

Prayer: Heavenly Father, I pray that You cause me to see other races through Your eyes. Please cleanse me of any hate, prejudice, or racism, that I have against my brothers and sisters. Help me represent the love of Jesus Christ on the Earth today, in the name of Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.

There is a lot that I wanted to say that would not fit in a normal message time frame, so consider this an extended message. I want to be clear that God views all races the same, none are His favorite. For example, In the Welsh Revival of 1904, God used a young white man named Evan Roberts. In the Azusa Street Revival of 1906, God used an older black man named William Seymour. He is speaking through Chinese people in China, and Africans in Africa. None of us have God on a leash. He is at work in every nation.

Jesus Christ was not White, Black, nor Indian. When Jesus was born as a man on Earth, He was born to middle eastern Jewish parents, Israelites.  which means that He was probably about 5 1/2 foot tall, brown eyes, dark brown to black hair, olive skin, with short hair and a beard, for that is what common Judean men of that time period looked like. About the 19th century people began to develop theories that Jesus was white, black, indian, or some other race. Those are fairy tales. Nothing in scripture supports that. That said, Jesus is divine and He can change His appearance at will. The disciples on the road to Emmaus did not recognize Him (Luke 24:15), neither did Mary at the tomb. She thought He was the gardener (John 20:15). If He appeared to you, He may appear as your race, or you may see Him as John did in Revelation 1:12:

(Revelation 1:12–17 NKJV)  Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of fire; His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters; He had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead.

Don’t try and reduce the Lord Jesus Christ to a particular race like white or black or Indian, for He is above that and He has His own thing going called “Glowing like the Sun.” His skin is the color of fine brass refined in a furnace. While researching this, I came across several articles written by people who were trying to make the Jesus that John saw, match the color of their race.

John said that Jesus was the color of “fine brass, refined in a furnace.” Most of you know that I polished a lot of brass in my life. My first public job was polishing the brass on the carousel at the Myrtle Beach Pavillion during the summer break when I was about 15. Years later I polished brass for a living on a buffing wheel in a brass plant. Sometimes I would polish 7,000 parts a day. Later I rose to be the manager, and I inspected the brass that other people had polished. I watched over it from the raw state, to being being sanded, to being polished, to being dipped in chrome, then packed, and shipped out the door. If you want to talk about the color of brass, I’m your man.

This is fine brass. Freshly refined brass does not look like any race of people on the Earth unless you happen to be angelic, and it greatly resembles gold. So when it comes to skin color, God has His own thing going. One day, we will be like Him, but He will never be like us. I suggest we leave it at that.

What about interracial marriage? Consider Moses. After the death of his wife Zipporah, or possibly in addition to her, Moses married a Cushite, a woman from Ethiopia, in Africa. The Arabic name is Sudan, meaning “land of the blacks.” There is no doubt that Moses married a black woman. His sister Miriam, and then Aaron, who were both light skinned, did not like it and grumbled about it:

(Numbers 12:1–4 NASB)  Then Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married (for he had married a Cushite woman); and they said, “Has the LORD indeed spoken only through Moses? Has He not spoken through us as well?” And the LORD heard it. (Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any man who was on the face of the earth.) Suddenly the LORD said to Moses and Aaron and to Miriam, “You three come out to the tent of meeting.” So the three of them came out.

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(Numbers 12:9–10 NASB)  So the anger of the LORD burned against them and He departed. But when the cloud had withdrawn from over the tent, behold, Miriam was leprous, as white as snow.

When Miriam, Mose’s sister who is named first in the verse, spoke against Moses for marrying a woman from a different race, the anger of the Lord burned against her and He struck her with leprosy. Basically He said “You like being light skinned Miriam? I can make you as white as snow.” And for seven days, she was. Meanwhile, God was perfectly fine with His servant Moses marrying a woman with a different skin color. Miriam had the problem, and God addressed it.

The Lord’s Supper:  The body of Christ is made up of all believers, from all races and colors of people, from all walks of life. If a cell in the body starts to attack other healthy cells around it, then it becomes harmful to the entire body and needs to be dealt with. God does this very thing to His body, and it is very dangerous is to take part in communion, signifying that you are a part of the body of Christ, without properly discerning the body of Christ. Paul wrote it this way:

(1 Corinthians 11:27–31 NKJV)  Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged.

Many grow weak, sick, and then die, because they are not recognizing the person they hate is also a cell in the body of Christ. If you continue to attack other members of the body, God may take you home early. Before you partake in communion, forgive people of the things that you have against them and examine yourself to be sure you have nothing against your brothers and sisters.

Love and Hate: God is love (1 John 4:8) and His children are to love one another regardless of their skin color just as He does. Hate, racism, brutality, intimidation, and injustice are from the devil, people doing the works of their father.

We are the children of God. We come from all races. We come from all walks of life. We are part of one body, the body of Christ.

May the Lord fulfill His will in Your life, open the right doors for you and your family, protect, provide, comfort, and guide you throughout this season, in the name of Jesus Christ I pray. Amen.

Pastor Dion