With Love In Our Hearts

If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing.  If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.  1 Corinthians 13:1-3

Let me set the record straight.  I do have gay friends and relatives.  As a Christian, I know God hates sin, and what is written about homosexuality has been both verbalized and preached to me numerous times.  There is one major problem that I have with it all.  I can go down a path of pointing out the numerous places where Paul spoke of the ills of that lifestyle, but the thing is it speaks to their relationship with God.  Not mine.  More importantly, it does not speak to my relationship to them.  To be honest, I struggle with even saying the word ‘them.’  They are us, and we are them.  I simply love people, and I will not accept the idea I need to have a different standard of who do I love because God understands we are all flawed.  We are all people struggling to meet a standard of perfection that none of us can ever hope to meet.  Romans 3:23 says, “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.”  This is not to say we should neither strive to grow in Christ nor continue to sin against God.  It simply says we will never be perfect.  It is why Christ died on the cross to become the perfecter of our faith.  Through Him, all who believe are made perfect.  And this is why we must always choose to love.  Love of our neighbor.  Love ourselves.  Love different people.  And more importantly, love in our hearts.

Love for God transcends all other forms of responses.  There is a reason Paul said of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, “This Good News tells us how God makes us right in His sight. This is accomplished from start to finish by faith. As the Scriptures say, “It is through faith that a righteous person has life.”” (Romans 1:17)  This is both clear and true, but it is not the whole story.  In the same chapter Paul said, “Well then, if we emphasize faith, does this mean that we can forget about the law? Of course not! In fact, only when we have faith do we truly fulfill the law.” (Romans 3:31)  So where do we go from here?  We must focus foundationally on the idea of love.  Why?  The Greatest Commandment speaks of it saying this:

 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’  This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”  Matthew 22:37-40

Note the last verse (The entire law …) said these two verses are the basis for the entire law.  Not some.  Not most.  All!  So, if we are connecting the dots, our faith in Jesus Christ is shown by a love for God and our neighbor, and as such through that same faith, we are made righteous in the law.  It is the reason Paul would end that same 13th chapter saying, “Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13:13)

Without love, nothing can proceed.  There can be no understanding or wisdom, no spiritual gifts to understand God, no faith that moves mountains, and no sacrifice great enough for God’s glory.  This is why this chapter is so foundational for our faith.  Just as we cannot go upstream in a boat without a paddle, we cannot grow in our faith without love for God and others.  Why?  “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”  Let us love as He has loved us.  Who can you open your heart to that you have not before?  What does a better love for God and others look like?  My prayer is that we simply are willing to show greater love in our hearts. Amen.

This Devotion was written and contributed to The Hope Fellowship by Kent Williams