"And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." (1 Corinthians 13:13)
No matter how anointed we are in our preaching, teaching, evangelizing, ministering, etc ... there is no greater evidence of our knowledge of God than how we LOVE one another. Love comes from God and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows Him. (1 John 4:7) The indwelling of God's love in us perfects our human character. Without it, we have no foundation on which to build our Christian lives.
Love is not just an attribute of God's character ... It IS God! (1 John 4:16) It is the very essence of God's being. In John 13:34-35, we are commanded to love one another. This command is not referring to a physical affection or emotion, but a purposeful, voluntary SPIRITUAL affection; an unselfish concern for the well-being of others whether or not we feel they are deserving of our love. Even our enemies are to receive our love despite their attitude, or behavior toward us. (Luke 6:27-28) For despite our unworthiness, God loved us and made the greatest sacrifice to prove it.
God's Love for Mankind
"For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16)
God loves us so intensely that He purposed His Son to be unmercifully tortured, beaten, scorned, scrutinized and murdered ... all in the name of Love. He has bestowed His perfect love upon us, seeking those who are deemed the most wretched and alienated from Him that they may be saved. His is a redeeming love manifested in mercy and grace, for He cares for and help us when we are in need, and He accepts us and loves us even though we don't deserve it.
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...adulthood, our spouses can turn away from us in anger or frustration, our friends and relatives turn away for a multitude of reasons. But we can rejoice in the fact that there is ONE relationship where we will always find love ... our relationship with God. There is nothing that can separate us from God's love -- His love endureth forever! (Psalms 118)
Thanking God:
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your mercy, grace and above all ... Your love. Without it we have no hope ... we have no future ... we have no life!
We thank You for Your ability to look beyond our faults, and see our needs. We rejoice in Your mercy, for it has "made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions"; Your grace, for "it is by grace that we have been saved"; and Your love, for in love You "sent Your one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him."
“This He did out of sheer love for us” (Athanasius 8). This quote refers to the amount of love that God had for humanity, this love had been strong enough to shine through our own rejection towards Him. It continues to do this. When the human race repeatedly rejected God, He continued to have mercy on us. “It was our sorry case that caused the Word to come down” (Athanasius 4). Why would God continue to love us after all this? God could not abandon us, His creation. If we look at kings and rulers in the time of Jesus, we would most likely see corruption and death. When a king was upset he would often take a violent path. God, on the other hand, chose to send someone kind and loving to help us rather than to hurt us. This proves that God is and was genuinely concerned for us, and wanted to see us prosper. “ Now that the common savior of all has died on our behalf, we who believe in Christ no longer die” (Athanasius 21). God wants us to have faith in Him, He wants us to live forever with Him. Another king might bring death upon his people rather than on himself only for his well being not of his people’s. When Jesus died He gave us the option of life over death. All we must do is have faith and believe that He is the on...
God is sinless, loving, forgiving and full of wisdom. God’s love is shown throughout the Old and New Testaments. Many times throughout the Old
· Thanks – this is when we say thank you to God and Jesus in prayer
He first question ?How freely does God love the world!? he goes on to say that God showed His love while we were still sinners. Even before we had started a relationship with Him. That God sent His son to bear
A feeling that cannot be defined, an emotion that can only be expressed, and a word that is used in everyday life, is what we know as love. Throughout history, there have been many different opinions and interpretations of love. When a person is asked, “what is love?" many people find the answer more difficult to explain than they initially thought. The book Symposium describes love as, "the motivating force in all of us" (Page 11). The book also explains that Plato analyzes many kinds of love and one of those kinds of love may now be considered what one would call "Christian love." Christianity is a large influence on love today, particularly the fact that the Bible says God 's love is unconditional and he loves all creatures. This belief starts to somewhat conflict with Plato 's views because Plato links love to desire and God does
...Pentecostal’s hold, that “God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
The Lord's Prayer Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread.
... loved more than loving others. Hence, we are never satisfied. The only way for a human being to be fully satisfied of love is to be loved by the absolute completeness. The whole representation of love is God and He is perfect. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, was perfect and love, which was how he died on the cross for the sins of others. The ultimate wholeness of love died for the sins of you and me. Christ did not die in order to take benefit from human beings. He is perfect in himself; he does not need mankind to fulfill his completeness. Hence, Christ died on the cross simply because he loves mankind. He loves you and me so much he gave his own life. What greater love is there than the love of Jesus Christ? As much as human beings strongly desire to be loved, why doesn’t one satisfy one’s hunger of love through the ultimate representation of love, Jesus Christ?
The apostle John declared: “God is love.” In the Koine Greek, Agape love is that not only that love is from God, but that it is of God. God Himself loves. Love is one of the moral attributes of God Agape love is self-sacrificing. The LORD Almighty loved the world so much that He sent His only son, to death; death on a cross. .
"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." This verse - John 3:16 - is perhaps the most important in the Bible. Jesus Christ was the son of God, but he was also the son of man.
A hug, a kiss, or even a small smile can be contemplated as an act of love. Love affects not only others around you, but also affects you the most! Friendship, relationship, devotion, or cherishing those around you. Love is all you need! But, you also need patience. Just a little patience shows the self-control you have as a believer. In times of great distress, this fruit of the spirit allows you to have forbearance with others. Others around you who have this fruit show just as much or even a greater amount of strength. The ability to control their tongue, actions, and what happens. All we need is just a little patience (Guns N’ Roses). Faith proves how great we are at following in god’s footsteps. Predominately, faithfulness shows that as believers, they have a steadfast holding and great adoration for whatever they look up to. Whether it is the God most worship, or other gods. Faithfulness knows no bounds and thrives within many
What is love? I remember a time when “I love you” was the hardest phrase to say to the person you really had feelings for because you knew when you said those words it would change the course of your relationship forever. But what is the true meaning of love? “The dictionary defines love as a feeling of strong personal attach-ment induced by sympathetic understanding or by ties of kindred; ardent affection for one’s children; man’s adoration for God; strong liking; fondness; good will, al love of learning; love of country.” (Bell, pg. 10) According to Bell all of these definitions convey the outward appearance of love. He says that when looking at love that we need to take an inventory of our feeling to find out if we are truly displaying the type of love that God calls agape love. Bell says we need to ask ourselves the following questions: Do I return love? In any relationship love is a two way street. A marriage or relationship will not last very long if only one person is showing love and the other is not responding in kind. As a matter of fact, a spiritual relationship works in pretty much the same way. The bible says that God first loved us, but if we do not return that love to Him the relationship may diminish. As a Christian we must first love the unsaved person just enough to go to them and share the good news of the gospel. Then after that person has received the gospel of Jesus it is then up to them to accept it and return the love by giving their life to Christ. “Ministry is the first stage of this exchange of love.” (Bell, Pg 11)
Love by definition is an emotion explored in philosophy, religion, and literature, often as either romantic love, the fraternal love of others, or the love of God based on the definition found in The Encarta Encyclopedia. As I explored the definition by means of the Internet, books, and articles I noticed the definitions changed quite a bit, but yet had the same basic understanding. The definition I found in The Encarta Encyclopedia was probably the most simple and most basic. It refers to love in the whole aspect, which is Godly, fraternal, and romantic. All in which can only be defined by one word and that it love.
The word love is mentioned in the Bible an average of 437 times, depending on the translation, so love is important to the basis of Christianity. One of the most profound pieces of Scripture discussing love is the overused John 3:16, which reads: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life” (The New Oxford Annotated Bible). This verse brings up the subject of sacrifice, reminding the audience that they have been saved through someone’s death and resurrection. Jesus was crucified so people he had never met would have eternal life in Him; He loved humanity so much that He was willing to die for us to save us. Since Jesus is wholly man and wholly God, we are also able to say that God loved humanity so much that He was willing to die for us to save us. Furthermore, God did not love just a few people, but rather, the entire world. Christ died for everyone, no matter each individual situation. He died for the believers and the non-believers. He died for the sinners and the saints. He died to save everyone for all
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.” These scriptures clearly point out God’s love. In George W. Peters book A Biblical Theology of Missions says this about God’s love, “Divine love is that impelling and dynamic quality in which God moves out of Himself and in which He relates Himself in all His beneficence and sufficiency to His creation. His love motivates Him eternally to communicate and to impart Himself to the object of His relationship” (59 & 60). Peters notes, love is: outgoing dynamic relationship (Romans 5:8), sacrificial active relationship (John 3:16), comprehensive relationship (John 3:17), and finally love is manifold relationship; which he says manifolds according to the character, conditions and needs of its object” (60). God is love. Also God is relational; Peter says on page 57, “God is a God of relationships”; the book of Ezekiel 37:27 says, “My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people” and Jeremiah 32:38 says, “ They will be my people, and I will be their God.” From these scriptures it is clearly known that God the Father desires intimate relationship with His people. The