Okay, here is the best point that Donald Miller makes in this book. You will find it on page 238. "...I realized, after reading those gospels, that Jesus didn't just love me out of principle." The rest of this paragraph is what makes me like Donald Miller without ever meeting him. While he and I are probably poles apart on most issues, I appreciate the way he paints this scene.
If we love only out of principle, because God says we have to, is it no wonder that our churches are often empty? If God is love, shouldn't love be part of our nature and not something we do out of obligation?
I read once where pastor D.G. Hargrove committed to giving something away every day. An idea like that is not born out of principle, but springs from a heart that wants to love - not one that feels like it has to. Can people tell the difference? I think so.
If love is only an obligation to a principle, then it lasts only until the conscience is soothed. But love that flows from the nature of its source continues past the point of obligation. That love suffers long and is kind, does not envy, seeks not its own, is not puffed up, does not promote itself, is not easily provoked, thinks no evil; but it beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
Loving out of principle won't last that long. True Christians will love because they have been born again and it is part of their nature. Not because the Bible says they must.
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