13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.
In my experience in the body of Christ, the question "What does love have to do with it?" is all too common. We achieve these great aspects in development in God and we grow in ministry and in personal character but the one thing that we forget is the one thing that is most important, LOVE! From my understanding, as we continue in this walk with Christ we are suppose to be following in His footsteps. In this next verse of scripture we even find the secret to Christ's ability to attract the people and help them see the light.
Jeremiah 31:3 says "3 Long ago the Lord said to Israel “I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love.With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself." As the scripture says, it wasn't His flashiness, His power, His knowledge or any of that but it was His love.
As He has drawn us His people to Him through love we are to draw those who aren't saved and those who have not been witnessed to through love. The mistake we most often make is quoting scriptures, and attempting to know what these people need versus just loving them and allowing them to see Christ through our actions and thus making a way for anything else they may need through Christ
As most would agree we have to first define the subject matter before we are able to teach, preach and most importantly live it. One of the various biblical definitions of love can be found in...
1 Corinthians 13:4-8... "4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[a] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever!"
Love done correctly personifies all these things and is more concerned with the person being loved and being effective than being selfish. Love sums up the character of God and shows us who we are to be by where we are to start...
This type of love actually spans farther than from God to man, and Man to unbeliever but from Christian to Christian...
Mark 12:31 "31 The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[a] No other commandment is greater than these.” It is so important that we not only love in words but to love in deed. The scripture says to love as if they were yourself. If we as a body would love each other with the same intensity that we love ourselves we would be making a lot more progress and making greater moves for the kingdom. Love isn't just an emotion or a state of mind but love actually has power to it. The scriptures speak of what love is able to do and most of all what love has done for us...
8 Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins.
Not to say love will cover us from being able to sin, or love will block out our sins but love has the ability to weaken sins control over us. If we as brothers and sisters loved each other as the scriptures have said then confessing to one another wouldn't be as hard and getting delivered from sin wouldn't be so hard because we would be able to be transparent and allow others to help us with in prayer and guidance.
In conclusion love has done something for us that nothing else in this world could award or afford us. Love has put us in position to receive a savior, to redeemed, and to have our relationship reconciled with God the Father...
John 3:16 says 16 “For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life."
Please feel free to comment, ask questions and give
respective opinions and perspectives...
And always in all things keep God first and contend
for the faith!!! God Bless.
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