I think there are some impersonal Christians.
Don't get me wrong, I don't mean they are unfriendly or aloof. Instead I am referring to their relationship with God. The Bible warns against merely understanding without knowing God. When the Bible uses the word "know" for salvation, it almost always uses a word that denotes a personal and intimate connection, like when Adam 'knew' his wife and she gave birth to a son. That's pretty intimate.
Yet many Christians seem to focus more on being close to God through information than intimacy. They can argue about his Word and win. They know the finer points of theology but they have little intimate open relationship with God.
God reveals in the Bible that His heart, and the heart of a relationship with Him is built on love. God is love. God loves the world. God loves us. We are to love Him. This love for Him will also be reflected in how we react to others. In other words, if you want to know how someone's love for God is doing, look at how they are reacting to others.
1 John 4:19-20 We love, because He first loved us. (20) If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
1 John 2:9-11 The one who says he is in the Light and yet hates his brother is in the darkness until now. (10) The one who loves his brother abides in the Light and there is no cause for stumbling in him. (11) But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
This is where our theology gets intimate. Do we loudly and proudly proclaim His truth, meditate on His truth and think great thoughts about God but not open our hearts and lives to Him in humility and intimacy? Do we find ourselves more defined by our theology stands and ability to judge people based on proper theology than on how loving we are to the world that God loves?
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 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. (2) 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. (3) 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.
I think that without a personal, intimate connection to God, we end up with people who are theologically accurate but a bunch of noisy gongs. They understand, they meditate, they even preach, but they do not reveal the characteristic love that defines a true intimate life with God.
When you have come to know Him, in true deep intimate ways, you will be filled with love, for God and for others. You will be known for your love for the brothers, for your enemies, for everyone.
Are you an impersonal Christian? Do you spend a lot of time learning, studying, and meditating on His truth, but little time being intimate with Him? Are you known for your love?
