Aug 2

1 John 4:11–12 (NIV84)
11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

There are couples in this world who claim to love one another. They have pledged themselves to one another and have given one another a commitment of relationship, however when you watch them operate, you see displays of pent up aggression, you hear the sharpness in their speech and you feel the disunity at times. I can think of people who I haven’t seen a tender touch or a sincerely tender word back and forth between them. They may have commitment, but they don’t have love. How can I judge? Like the empire says, “I calls em’ as I sees em’”. Love MUST been seen – yes even in public!

Over and over in this book of 1 John it talks about loving one another. It is the marker of whether God lives in us or not. How in the world can you tell that someone loves another unless they demonstrate it – publically – like The Father and Jesus have done? Again, it IS THE marker of whether God lives in us or we are a phony Christian!

It is obvious that we “ought” to have love for one another because God loves us – all of us. If He loves everyone, then we ought to love everyone because He has valued them enough for His love. There is this thought, really a principle in verse 12; if we are a lover of people (especially the brethren as this book refers to), then God’s love is working in us and through us. In fact it has been made complete in us! That is crazy to think about. The way we love others is directly related to the way we allow and understand God’s love for us. That is something to meditate on!