Does this mean that all people who hate a person are not children of God? I'm stuck on this and need Kingdom revelation please--1 John 3:10

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30something: don't know but I know one thing...YOU are a child of God.

at 10:19PM 06/20/09

mommykins: I don't want to say yes because that sounds so harsh...but can both love and hate flow from the same springl? If God is love then if God abides in us..how can hate also abide in us. Hate is also a very strong word usually associated with murder and wishing ill towards someone. That's clearly the devil...

at 10:34PM 06/20/09

laurarich: Good word Sharon :)

at 10:45PM 06/20/09

willmatthews: Scriptures are also pretty clear that we are being transformed by the renewing of our minds. Though these scriptures seem harsh, when put together with other new testament passages it is pretty clear that this is the standard by which we live by, but it's not achieved over night. The fact that you care shows your a child of God.

at 12:15AM 06/21/09

openjoe: It seems to me that this in I John is admonition, or exhortation. Not judgment.

at 05:15AM 06/21/09

sonfleur: Yes, Joe, I agree! God is not going to throw you away because your heart is having trouble loving someone! But God has set a high standard for us to live by. And we certainly do NOT get there easily! Sometimes we have been hurt so badly, that it can be difficult to get past! But God encourages us to love our enemies! There have been times when my forgiveness to those who hurt me (and my family), on purpose did not come easy! But the work that is being done in me is God's work, not mine! HE is faithful to complete it! We could never do it on our own!

at 06:27AM 06/21/09

lowah507: So I though about it and prayed on it and read it myself and here is what I got. Who is it you think you hate and why do you hate them? Take that person and pray for them, ask God to give you his love for them in your heart. We are new craetions, we do not go around hateing our brothers, and by brothers I take that to be ALL people, not just brother from your mother. Before you were a follower of Christ, how easy was it to totally hate on people, to get fed up, write them off, and also spend time in the anger and hate you felt for people. Now we are instructed to LOVE all people,just as God first loved us. Do you now have a total different reaction to people? Do you in general love the people of the earth and see them in the hurt and suffering they are going through and know that they too need Jesus, and pray that they find him as you did? If we go around professing to be christians and yet still are totally filled with hate for our fellow brothers, then are we really being like Christ? Are we children of God if once the Holy Spirit takes up residence in us our attitudes do not change towards others, then we need to ask God to change that. The verses before this are also talking about how when we make practice of sinning we are children of the devil, but when we make practice of rightousness we are children of God. So even if we sin, and who doesn't, we are still God's kids because we do not choose the way of sinning. We choose to try and be more like Jesus with every day we have and with every breath we take. We ask forgiveness, recieve it, and move on, knowing that we car hryim with us to take to a dying and hungry world.

at 01:35PM 06/21/09

lowah507: *oops - carry him with us

at 01:36PM 06/21/09

ingamae: Awesome thanks everyone!!! I don't hate anyone but I know people who love God and do hate some that have severly hurt them in a context I could never understand so this passage just struck my heart as I thought of friends and relatives who say they hate certain individuals and it made my heart sad to think they were thinking they were children of God but not so because they hated someone ---God is such a lover so it just struck me as opposite--I love those who hate me so I can pour Gods love on them and get broken from hate instead of telling them they are a child of the devil so it was just an odd thing to tell a group of believers i thought. It might create a reason to label someone or treat someone differently just because they hate ...

at 11:36PM 06/21/09

openjoe: I hated a person for seven years, and by extension a whole class of people. Finally I came to repentance to my great relief.
Then, soon after I had a new situation and I could feel the tentacles of hate forming again. I think I need a deeper repentance and healing now.

at 05:34AM 06/22/09

sonfleur: Continue to ask God to help you with it, Joe. God IS faithful to complete the work He began in you! I have found that there are layers of healing. I think I am over something, and then God opens a deeper layer, and the healing process starts over.

at 06:17AM 06/22/09

akvietti22: In my opinion the word hate could mean two things. The feeling and the act of hating someone. You know? I believe that God built us with the feeling/emotion of hate (which could mean really just a lot of bundled up emotions anger, sadness, hurt, etc) so that we are aware when someone is abusing us. But the actual act of hating someone would be more of our will to choose to hate someone. I hope that makes sense.

at 05:05PM 06/22/09

whomheloves: I think the whole "hate" thing is kindofa tangent from what this passage is saying. Scripture tells us that _there is a time to hate_. We also know that God, who _is_ love, hates sin. So hate itself (directed at sin or the enemy, not ourselves or each other), is not bad. Hate is not the opposite of love. Selfishness is. If we turn 1 Cor. 13 upside down we get a pretty good picture of selfishness:

Selfishness is impatient, selfishness is unkind. It envies, it boasts, it is proud. It is rude, it is self-seeking, it is easily angered, it keeps record of wrongs. Selfishness does what it can get away with, and avoids the truth when convenient. It saves its own skin, holds itself from others, abandons hope, and is quick to sacrifice its flimsy morals for personal gain.

What John is saying is that selfish, unloving people cannot be children of God. The rest of us, by God's grace, are willing to let Him fix us.

at 08:53PM 06/22/09

lowah507: @whomheloves - totally! I am going to write that out as a reminder to myself.

at 11:44PM 06/22/09

koshermusica: Yes Christopher

at 11:55PM 06/22/09

mommykins: If you read on to verse 15 it says " Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding within him." For myself...for me to hate...is a action...not an emotion...Personally, I feel I would have to turn away from God...no matter how hurt I was, to hate someone the way they mention in verse 15. God commands us to love. I have been hurt and very angry...and possibly even hated for a short time,but I know during that time my relationship with God was severly affected. I knew I had to forgive if I wanted my relationship with God to continue. If you read the preceding verse 6 it is talking about those who practices sin...knows it's wrong but chooses to do it anyway (not just once but habitually) doesn't and never has known God. This is not to say we can't make bad choices or sin...but to continually walk in sin or do something you know is wrong continually without remorse...I don't know how one could be a child of God. Please hear me...I'm not talking about struggling with forgiveness or anger towards someone, God knows are hearts better than we do, and if we are trying to love and forgive we are pursueing God and His word not turning from Him.

at 01:00AM 06/23/09

whomheloves: @mommykins
I agree! The main thrust of my point is that hating a person is a symptom of selfishness, but hating sin is a symptom of loving. That's because the act and emotion of loving each put others' wants and needs before our own. We "murder" our desires for the sake of another person.

at 04:54AM 06/23/09

whomheloves: And just to clarify, if that other person loves us back, then they also "murder" their own desires. In the end we all become dead to ourselves but alive in another...
::coughJesuscough:: ;D

at 04:56AM 06/23/09

whomheloves: (everyone gets loved and fulfilled)

at 04:57AM 06/23/09

whomheloves: hahahaah, one more. I should have said we "murder" our selfishness.

woulda been more consistent with my first post.

at 05:00AM 06/23/09

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Does this mean that all people who hate a person are not children of God? I'm stuck on this and need Kingdom revelation please--1 John 3:10
at 09:53PM

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