Love and God

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

1st John 4:7: Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

The love that John is describing here is not the type of love that most people know. Most people, when they think about love, think that love is all sweet and everybody is happy. When people think of love, they refer to the love they see on the Hallmark Channel Christmas movies. People see love in the physical attraction to one another, also.

What I described above are aspects of love that God gave to us. At the same time, they're not the whole description of love. "But wait, there's MORE!"

So what does love mean? When God through John says to "love one another," He means to be supportive, nurturing, uplifting, and caring more for the needs of the other person more than your own. Love means to give of yourself, even maybe to the point of sacrificing yourself. It means being a shoulder to cry on, a heart to break with the other person when his or her heart is breaking. This love also means to say, "I'm sorry. Please forgive me." This love also means to say, "No." when someone wants you to say, "Yes." For sometimes the most loving thing to do is to say, "No."

From whom does this aspect of love come? It comes from God. Believers in God live in this aspect of love. Believers in God believe and know that He sent Jesus, His one and only Son, into the flesh to take upon Himself our frailty and give forgiveness when Jesus died on the cross. God's great love raised Jesus from the grave in order to give to us resurrection from sin and death into the new life of grace and love.

And since we know and believe that God did all of this for us, we love in the manner He gave to us. That also includes the physical and the emotional forms. Love is a total package. Let us then live as His disciples loving people with the love that He gave to us through Jesus. Dear God, thank You for Your love. Guide me to love in the way You love, Amen!