More, More, and Even More on LOVE

• For God so loved the world that He gave…
• Love your enemies…
• Love is from God…
• Above all, love each other deeply for love covers over a multitude of sins…
• Love must be sincere…
• Love your neighbor as yourself…
• Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
• Bear with one another in love.
• There is no fear in love. But [God’s] perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.
• We love [at all] because God first loved us.
• Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in…Jesus.
• Herein is love, not that we loved God first, but that God loved us first.
• And over all virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.
• Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.
• Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
• Whoever does not Love does not know God, because God is Love.

All of the previous lines are Scriptures from the New Testament. And this is just a sampling. But it is amazing to see them all together, along with the “love chapter” from the book of Corinthians. All this talk of love, it’s so powerful that this divine love, should be overwhelming – overwhelming us inwardly and outwardly, overwhelming our communities, our world. Instead, what do I read, hear, and see all about me, but Christians NOT showing this type of Love.  Instead, I hear more talk of guns than this graceful love, hating President Obama, hating Republicans, hating Democrats, judging Atheists, and a litany of homophobic and Islamophobic dribble.

If you are not a believer, may you find hope and may you have your own personal experience of this God who is Love. If you are a believer, let these words guide your every action and belief, your understanding of your faith, your denomination, your Church, your political beliefs, your treatment of the earth and ALL the people in it –  let it be guided by THESE words on love.

This is not love as defined by one simple day called Valentine’s Day. This is not love as defined by political parties or Hollywood or even specific faiths. This is not cultural, nor is it political. It is not even religious per se.

This is about DIVINE LOVE…the unfathomable, and in reality indescribable, love of God (that I am doing no justice to by limiting it with my words and perspective).

So if God is love (which God truly is) then all of it (all of creation, life, existence) is summed up in the word LOVE.