The Deception of “Performance Love”
Why is the thing that is suppose to be so strongly woven together, supposed to be unsinkable so fragile that in even calm waters it sinks reaping destruction of people’s lives and destroying relationships?
This is not only reality in the “secular” world but in the religious world as well. A lot of times in both worlds we try to hide broken love by the wearing of the expectation mask. Our loving requires commitment and expectations to be filled by all parties in the love boat. When commitment and expectations are not fulfilled cracks of disappointment, non-trust, un-forgiveness, selfishness and hate appear in the fabric that floats the boat, the shame and blame game is played, shipwreck happens and heartache is the winner.
In our world the “love boat of life” is shipwrecked and sorrowing, heartbroken and guilt ridden people are strewn along the shores of life, because shame and blame is the name of the game people play.
The love that is the life of the love boat is flawed, it is not genuine. Because it is the only kind of love we KNOW! I emphasized know because in the religious world we are often told about another kind of love...the God kind...but it is seldom if ever demonstrated by religious people. The deception is that the enemy has planted in our DNA from conception a false gene that gives us the wrong perspective as to what love is, and most of us, from birth to death fail to realize this and go to our graves without experiencing genuine and true love.
Our love gene has been compromised with the defective DNA of PERFORMANCE! Thus, we have swallowed hook, line and sinker that “performance love” is true love.
Performance love is inferior because it needs stimulation in order to survive. It forever seeks to earn and merit the love it gets in return. The satisfaction, enjoyment and return for the love shown depends solely on the excellency of our ability to perform to the expectation of those we love.
We have all experienced this concept of love and most of us live in this concept all our lives thinking that it is genuine. The irony in this is that the people who claim to know God are witnesses of His love and demonstrate God’s love to the fellow religious people and the people of the world because they themselves only know about God’s love in their mind rather than knowing it in their heart and living it in life.
Performance love is the only kind of love that the majority of has ever known. Outside of the love of God in Christ Jesus and experiencing and living that experience we will not KNOW the God kind of love. We may know about it, but that does not mean we know it.
Performance love is what we first learned at on our parents lap. We were taught in practice that if we were good boys and girls we would be accepted and loved. We went to school and learned that the teacher favored and loved good students and performed well and that, somehow, those who did not perform to a satisfactory standard were shut out of the in group. Wow, do I remember this one...in Sunday school we learned that God up above was looking down in love so be careful little children what you do. This left me with the impression that if I did not perform the expectations of what religion thought were God’s standards I God would not love me. Thus they maintained an element of control over me by by the fear that if I did not DO right God would not love me. This first introduction of God’s love was infected with the defective performance gene in that the love He offered was regulated by my performance.
It was established that he would love me as long as I performed well in service to Him. But when I fail in religious disciplines...slack off in my church attendance, my prayer life, my bible reading, my tithing, not obeying my elders, thinking the wrong thoughts and acting on those wrong thoughts God no longer loves me.
I learned that God is not consistent in His loving and that His reward of love was when I did good, but if I did not perform correct God would punish me for doing that evil.
This concept led me to believe that performing to the satisfaction of other people’s expectations is the secret to a blissful relationship. That flawed concept has infected every person born, and ingrained in us...the problem is that our religious environment was to show us how the the DNA of God’s love was to eradicate the defective performance DNA of love but did not thus, then enemy as deceived the world into believing that performance love is true love.
In the religious world this performance love is so accepted that the aroma from it smells like honey do when in actual fact, I believe in the nostrils of God it stinks like crap!
One way it is demonstrated in the religious world as “Christian love” is; the Baptist love the Baptist, the Pentecostals love the Pentecostals, the JW’S love the JW’S, the Methodists love the Methodists all based on the crappy performance love syndrome that has nothing to do with God or His living in His kingdom. Yo can remove God from most of religion fellowships and their “love” would continue without interruption for in reality they love only those the like...such is the “performance love” trap.
I believe this is such a reality in both worlds because we do not know what TRUE LOVE is! True love is not based on conditions or expectations, neither is it based on commitment. Love that expects the expectation of reciprocation and an exchange of benefits is not TRUE LOVE! TRUE LOVE is a selfless love of the heart that is not based on expectation, reciprocation or any exchange from people you love.
Exchange may happen, but that is not why you love if your love is truly genuine.
True love is a choice to respond with action to peoples need without expecting expectations in return. Why? You must decide to love without expectation because what you expect may not be met. That is the essence of TRUE LOVE, to LOVE without EXPECTATION. The Bible says that Jesus laid His life down for us while we were yet sinners (Rom 5:8). He had no guarantee that we were going to respond in a positive manner. If you place expectation on love that expectation has to be maintained in order for love to remain. That expectation places an obligation on people to perform. If God had said, “I love you because you are holy,” that expectation of being holy would be to great for us to meet while causing much stress and pressure. God never does that. He simply says that He loves us. Being holy ought to be the natural outflow of His love in our lives, it is not being holy to gain the favor of His love. John 3:16, states, "For God so loved the world that he gave…” However, He does not demand that we respond to his love in a positive manner. That keeps the pressure off of us. This is the reality of true love. It has no reason or condition attached. That means there is nothing that you can do to stop God from loving you or to cause Him to begin loving you because He loved you when you were at your worst. Nor does it mean that you can do anything to cause Him to love you any less! God loves you not because of what you do or don't do, but because you are you and He is LOVE!
There is no measurable device invented to measure measureless therefore, genuine LOVE can never be measured because genuine LOVE is LOVE without measure! If you set expectations for LOVE you are seeking to make it measurable and if you are living with love expectations you are in a loveless relationship because you are not experiencing LOVE without measure! You are experiencing love to get, instead of experiencing love to give.
True LOVE is not increased or strengthened by the abundance of love shown nor diluted or diminished by the lack of love shown. True love is a constant and cannot be measured or influenced by the action or reaction of others. This love is available to us to give, in fact it is the only love worth expressing. This is the God kind of LOVE!
TRUE LOVE is MISERABLE-LESS and MEASURABLE-LESS and STRONG!
This is not only reality in the “secular” world but in the religious world as well. A lot of times in both worlds we try to hide broken love by the wearing of the expectation mask. Our loving requires commitment and expectations to be filled by all parties in the love boat. When commitment and expectations are not fulfilled cracks of disappointment, non-trust, un-forgiveness, selfishness and hate appear in the fabric that floats the boat, the shame and blame game is played, shipwreck happens and heartache is the winner.
In our world the “love boat of life” is shipwrecked and sorrowing, heartbroken and guilt ridden people are strewn along the shores of life, because shame and blame is the name of the game people play.
The love that is the life of the love boat is flawed, it is not genuine. Because it is the only kind of love we KNOW! I emphasized know because in the religious world we are often told about another kind of love...the God kind...but it is seldom if ever demonstrated by religious people. The deception is that the enemy has planted in our DNA from conception a false gene that gives us the wrong perspective as to what love is, and most of us, from birth to death fail to realize this and go to our graves without experiencing genuine and true love.
Our love gene has been compromised with the defective DNA of PERFORMANCE! Thus, we have swallowed hook, line and sinker that “performance love” is true love.
Performance love is inferior because it needs stimulation in order to survive. It forever seeks to earn and merit the love it gets in return. The satisfaction, enjoyment and return for the love shown depends solely on the excellency of our ability to perform to the expectation of those we love.
We have all experienced this concept of love and most of us live in this concept all our lives thinking that it is genuine. The irony in this is that the people who claim to know God are witnesses of His love and demonstrate God’s love to the fellow religious people and the people of the world because they themselves only know about God’s love in their mind rather than knowing it in their heart and living it in life.
Performance love is the only kind of love that the majority of has ever known. Outside of the love of God in Christ Jesus and experiencing and living that experience we will not KNOW the God kind of love. We may know about it, but that does not mean we know it.
Performance love is what we first learned at on our parents lap. We were taught in practice that if we were good boys and girls we would be accepted and loved. We went to school and learned that the teacher favored and loved good students and performed well and that, somehow, those who did not perform to a satisfactory standard were shut out of the in group. Wow, do I remember this one...in Sunday school we learned that God up above was looking down in love so be careful little children what you do. This left me with the impression that if I did not perform the expectations of what religion thought were God’s standards I God would not love me. Thus they maintained an element of control over me by by the fear that if I did not DO right God would not love me. This first introduction of God’s love was infected with the defective performance gene in that the love He offered was regulated by my performance.
It was established that he would love me as long as I performed well in service to Him. But when I fail in religious disciplines...slack off in my church attendance, my prayer life, my bible reading, my tithing, not obeying my elders, thinking the wrong thoughts and acting on those wrong thoughts God no longer loves me.
I learned that God is not consistent in His loving and that His reward of love was when I did good, but if I did not perform correct God would punish me for doing that evil.
This concept led me to believe that performing to the satisfaction of other people’s expectations is the secret to a blissful relationship. That flawed concept has infected every person born, and ingrained in us...the problem is that our religious environment was to show us how the the DNA of God’s love was to eradicate the defective performance DNA of love but did not thus, then enemy as deceived the world into believing that performance love is true love.
In the religious world this performance love is so accepted that the aroma from it smells like honey do when in actual fact, I believe in the nostrils of God it stinks like crap!
One way it is demonstrated in the religious world as “Christian love” is; the Baptist love the Baptist, the Pentecostals love the Pentecostals, the JW’S love the JW’S, the Methodists love the Methodists all based on the crappy performance love syndrome that has nothing to do with God or His living in His kingdom. Yo can remove God from most of religion fellowships and their “love” would continue without interruption for in reality they love only those the like...such is the “performance love” trap.
I believe this is such a reality in both worlds because we do not know what TRUE LOVE is! True love is not based on conditions or expectations, neither is it based on commitment. Love that expects the expectation of reciprocation and an exchange of benefits is not TRUE LOVE! TRUE LOVE is a selfless love of the heart that is not based on expectation, reciprocation or any exchange from people you love.
Exchange may happen, but that is not why you love if your love is truly genuine.
True love is a choice to respond with action to peoples need without expecting expectations in return. Why? You must decide to love without expectation because what you expect may not be met. That is the essence of TRUE LOVE, to LOVE without EXPECTATION. The Bible says that Jesus laid His life down for us while we were yet sinners (Rom 5:8). He had no guarantee that we were going to respond in a positive manner. If you place expectation on love that expectation has to be maintained in order for love to remain. That expectation places an obligation on people to perform. If God had said, “I love you because you are holy,” that expectation of being holy would be to great for us to meet while causing much stress and pressure. God never does that. He simply says that He loves us. Being holy ought to be the natural outflow of His love in our lives, it is not being holy to gain the favor of His love. John 3:16, states, "For God so loved the world that he gave…” However, He does not demand that we respond to his love in a positive manner. That keeps the pressure off of us. This is the reality of true love. It has no reason or condition attached. That means there is nothing that you can do to stop God from loving you or to cause Him to begin loving you because He loved you when you were at your worst. Nor does it mean that you can do anything to cause Him to love you any less! God loves you not because of what you do or don't do, but because you are you and He is LOVE!
There is no measurable device invented to measure measureless therefore, genuine LOVE can never be measured because genuine LOVE is LOVE without measure! If you set expectations for LOVE you are seeking to make it measurable and if you are living with love expectations you are in a loveless relationship because you are not experiencing LOVE without measure! You are experiencing love to get, instead of experiencing love to give.
True LOVE is not increased or strengthened by the abundance of love shown nor diluted or diminished by the lack of love shown. True love is a constant and cannot be measured or influenced by the action or reaction of others. This love is available to us to give, in fact it is the only love worth expressing. This is the God kind of LOVE!
TRUE LOVE is MISERABLE-LESS and MEASURABLE-LESS and STRONG!
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