Is Love Enough?

Not long ago, I was teaching at a kids' camp.
I used the story of a Jewish lawyer* that asked Jesus about how he could have eternal life. Jesus turns the tables on him and basically says, "You're the lawyer. How do you read The Law?"
The man replies, "Love God with everything you've got and love your neighbor as yourself."
Jesus says, "Do that and you'll be okay."

There is more to the story and you can read it in the link below.
I'm stopping here today because I received some criticism for this teaching -- that loving God and loving others is enough to have eternal life.
The thing is -- that isn't my teaching. It's from Jesus.

To be fair:
--I believe that Jesus is the perfect example of love.
--I believe that he came to teach us that God is love, to show us how to love like God, and to remind us that we are created in the loving image of God.
--I believe that it is through Jesus that we learn love and are able to receive eternal life.

But love really wasn't really the focal point of the criticism. The main point of the criticism was that I failed to tell these first graders that they are sinners and enemies of God. I was informed that most kids are unaware of this and need to be told. Kids need to know that God is an angry God and condemns all of his enemies to a fiery hell.

I have been doing children's ministry for a couple of decades now. My greatest fear is that I will one day stand before God and have to answer for misleading children about His love and grace. I fear that there will be even one kid that goes through life thinking they are okay with God because as a child they responded to guy that asked if they love Jesus and want to go to heaven even though they didn't really understand what it means to follow Jesus.

As an adult, I have a pretty difficult time coming to grips with "You're an enemy of God," and "God loves you."  I don't know how a six year old can process that. Also, I really don't want to scare people (children or adults) into heaven.

And I don't believe we should.
Jesus said that he will draw people to himself.
We merely have to show Jesus to others -- by what we say and by how we love.

Is love really enough?
Well, I'm not going to argue with Jesus. In fact, I think I'll work on following the example he gives us and teaching others do the same.

John <><

*My version of the beginning of the story of The Good Samaritan. For the NIV interpretation you can go here.