What Does Love Require?

You know, you don’t have to agree with me for me to love you? There is a growing movement that seems to be sweeping our nation that shows just the opposite.

Jesus came to teach us this: John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

We don’t see much of that love on display on our many screens, do we? I feel like those who profess to be followers of Jesus are getting caught up in the false belief that if others don’t believe what we believe, then they are just wrong. If we can’t convince them they are wrong, then there is just no hope for them and we will have to “cancel” our association with them. Really? Is that the example that Jesus gave us? Jesus was willing to die at the hands of those who disagreed with Him in order to prove His Love for all mankind, whether they believed He was The Truth or not.

It’s time, people of God, it’s time for us to show this broken world the power of love. The Truth will make itself known through that power. But time is growing short. God is growing weary. He has permitted his enemy to roam this earth, spreading lies of deceit and contention, while waiting for His People to overpower that hatred with love. He is still waiting patiently for the fruit of His Spirit to work in us and through us, but the Bible tells us in Matthew 3 that “He comes with a winnowing fork in his hands to his threshing floor to sift what is worthless from what is pure. And he is ready to sweep out his threshing floor and gather his wheat into his granary, but the straw he will burn up with a fire that can’t be extinguished!” God is the only one who has permission to “cancel” anyone–and even then it will only come after thousands of years of waiting, giving the world every possible chance to reconcile with Him.

You may be skeptical of this thinking. That’s okay. But don’t discount something without testing it. I have tested it. I have returned love to those who sought to do harm to me, and I have seen love win. I have loved those I don’t like and seen love win. God is a God of love and if we seek to honor Him, we are compelled to love. Jesus came to love and was rejected, ridiculed, tortured and killed. But His love was not in vain. It remains even today as the most powerful force in the universe. Are we willing to follow the example of Christ and love even to the point of death? What is there to fear? For those who follow Christ, death is the beginning of an eternity of living face to face with Our Creator in a place where there is no more sorrow, no more pain, no more evil. Love is what will get us to that place of eternal peace.

1 John 3:16 “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.”