“How great You are, O Sovereign LORD! There is no one like You, and there is no God but You, as we have heard with our own ears.”- 2 Samuel 7:22O Sovereign LORD; the Creator, Maker of heaven and earth; there is no God but You; King of kings; LORD of Lords; Name above all names; how great is our God? Mere words cannot express the Wonder that is our God.
Nor can words express the love with which God loves us. “For God so loved the world” (John 3:16); “the world”—that’s us—from the beginning of time until the present and onward until the end of time! “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent His one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him” (1 John 4:9).
Without God there is no love, “because God is love” (1 John 4:5). God is the inventor of—the author of—LOVE. “This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us…” (1 John 4:10). Mankind’s only capacity for love is through God. “We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19) and “whoever does not love does not know God” (1 John 4:5).
In the “love chapter” of the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, verses 1-3, we are told, without love we are nothing. Verses 4-7 describe love as patient, kind, without pride, rejoicing in truth, protective, trustful, hopeful, and persevering. Verse 8 tells us that love never fails. Verses 9-12 tells us when love is made perfect (through Christ)—when perfection comes—we shall know fully, even as we are known, (v. 12). The crescendo of the chapter is verse 13, “faith, hope and love—but the greatest of these is love”.
The Bible is a book of redemption because of God’s love for us. He gave His Son for us that we might believe in Him and live. The Bible is the story of Jesus. In the Old Testament He is predicted; in the Gospels, He is revealed; in the Acts, He is preached; in the Epistles, He is explained, and in the Revelation, He is expected. (Alistair Begg, http://www.truthforlife.org/)
We are to love because we are loved by God AND we are to love others with the same love by which we are loved! Jesus told His followers in Matthew 22:37-39, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'"
In John 13:34-35, Jesus told His disciples, "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." And further, in John 14:21, Jesus said, “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves Me. He who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I too will love him and show Myself to him."
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God (1 John 4:7). AMEN!
God Bless!
