1 John 4:9-12
"My dear friends, if God loved us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has seen God, ever. but if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us - perfect love! (The Message, vs. 11-12)It's hard to love from afar. You can't send a hug through the mail or phone line. Over the time from Creation, God had used many long distance means to share his love with the world, but ultimately he needed to deliver the love hug in person. So he sent Jesus to physically love us - or as the phone company would say, "he reached out and touched us"! But for this love to continue, for the plan to keep working, we have to keep the hug chain alive. When we love one another, God's love reaches through our hands and arms to hug the world. That's God-love dwelling in us and sharing God with all. Give a hug today....give God today.
In the intervening centuries since our Lord walked this earth we Christian have discussed much the attributes of the divine. Both John and Paul understood the only divine characteristic/attribute we need to know is LOVE. All else flows from God's love and all His gifts to us are for one reason, to empower us to love, and love is a verb. Love is not something we just talk about, it is something we do and in doing we become love. What are the gifts that God has given us, individually, which en-able and em-power us to Love and allow us to en-joy this divine love?
ReplyDeleteI love (no pun intended!) the concept that LOVE is a verb, not a noun!! An "empowering" verb always! Blessings!
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