Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. (1 John 4:7-12)
And one of them, a lawyer, asked [Jesus] a question to test him. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:35-40)
Scripture is clear. God is love … and God seeks love. Our 1 John 4 passage refers to love thirteen times while twice stating emphatically that love is an integral part of who God is. Our Matthew passage sets forth God’s “Great Commandment” of love and informs us that all God’s other commandments depend on this one. If we get love right, we get everything right.
Both passages also show how love of God and love of others are intertwined. If you do not love others, you don’t know God and can’t love God! (1 John 4:8, 20) God seeks our love for Himself and for everyone He loves because that is how we align ourselves with God.
The love involved here is, of course, not mere human love. It is agape love – God’s kind of love – as described in 1 Corinthians 13, the Sermon on the Mount, and the parable of the Good Samaritan. (Matthew 5:43-48; Luke 10:25-37) This love, perfectly revealed in Jesus Christ, is selfless, serving, and for family, friend, stranger, and enemy.
How important is this love of others to God? 1 Corinthains 13:1-3 tells us we can have right doctrine, faith to move mountains, and sacrificial giving of money or life, but if it isn’t motivated by agape love, we are nothing and gain nothing. The same truth would apply to today’s moral issues like abortion, marriage, and sexuality. We must stand for biblical truth, but if we don’t get love right, we don’t get anything right. Faith works through love and truth must be spoken in love. (Galatians 5:6; Ephesians 4:15)
For twenty years, I have repeatedly offered columns on love. What I want to focus on in this column is how God seeks our love.
God is sovereign, which means God is in control, but God is not controlling. His sovereignty includes His ability to delegate authority and responsibility, and He has done that by giving people “free will.” We get to choose whether we will love, trust and obey God. (Genesis 1-3)
Could God make everyone obey Him? Absolutely. He could make us like robots, but then we would not be created in His image and likeness. Instead, I believe He could simply implant a device in us that would “buzzzzz” us like a dog’s training collar whenever we said, did, or thought anything wrong. We would learn to obey.
But can God make us love Him or others? No! And that is the desire of God’s heart. He wants loving children in His everlasting family, not servants.
The Great Commandment, like all God’s commandments, is for our good, and God uses evangelism and discipleship to lovingly persuade people it is the right “Way” to live. (John 14:6) All those people Christians may view as their spiritual, political, or cultural enemies are, in the eyes of God, His lost sheep who have been led astray by the enemy. (Luke 15:3-7; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Isaiah 53:6) God wants them back! (1 Timothy 2:4-6; 2 Peter 3:9) And we Christians are the Lord’s witnesses and royal priesthood for that purpose. (Acts 1:8; 1 Peter 2:9)
The only way the lost can see God or come to know Jesus is through us, and that only happens when our lives consistently reveal how God loves us, how we love each other, how God loves them, and how we love them. The Holy Spirit pours God’s agape love into our hearts, but we must receive it and share it with everyone around us by following the Golden Rule and giving Jesus all the glory. (Romans 5:5; Matthew 5:16, 7:12)
This is the only way we can help God obtain what He seeks.
God bless you, and God bless our community.