In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him (1 John 4:9).
Loving God has one viewpoint and one point of view and both belong to Him alone. Our new viewpoint and point of view come from being in Christ. God tells us how to love Him, and we must do so unreservedly. “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30).
We must love the LORD seamlessly, which requires that we keep our total focus on Him and Him alone. Loving Him seamlessly means without stitches, gaps, or spaces, not having even the possibility of being pulled apart or unraveled. This is wholeness itself! The love of God is not just a warm feeling but is the reality of well-being and wholeness that only those who have experienced Him in salvation will ever know. How is all this received? It is done by believing that God sent Jesus into the world to save us from our sins, and the greatest sin of all was and is the sin of being unloving! When Adam sinned against God, the sin of being unloving came into the world. This is why Cain killed his brother Abel. He was an unloving, uncaring, and selfish man. Let us redouble our efforts to love selflessly as does our Father. As Christians, we know that love is God’s way, and it never does its neighbor harm; it never fails.
God’s message to us is not complicated! It is simple and crystal clear. “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him” (1 John 4:9). As we live through Jesus, love becomes the outworking of all we do. Jesus is God’s love revealed to mankind; and it is only through Him that we are able to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength and our neighbor as ourselves. In doing so, we will have fulfilled what the Father requires of us as one of His children; we will then be holy in experience and daily living, which are acquired by walking in the obedience of love. Love and obedience are irreversibly connected. If we love the Lord, we will obey Him. When we obey Him, we show that we love Him and others.
God is love, and since He is love, He is fulfilled within Himself. When we love Him, we experience His fulfillment within ourselves and thus, are able to love as He does. Loving the ungrateful and unkind, the evil and the good alike, is proof that we have been born of God and are His sons; “for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).
In His Love,
Pastor Don