Return To Love
‘Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”’
Matthew 22:37-40
In the days of Moses, there were 10 Commandments but in the New Testament, we have one commandment –love. This commandment is broken into two: love the Lord and love people.
The way of a believer is the way of Love. The way of man is to love –we are wired that way. The only thing that changes is the object of our love. It is clear from 2 Timothy 3 that the closer Jesus comes the more perverted love becomes. It becomes about self, money, and other things and less about God, people, or the things pleasing to God. But God is calling us to return to love again and love the right way.
Examine yourself, “Are you loving? Do you respond to people and situations out of love? Are you patient, kind, forgiving, sacrificial, selfless, tolerant, long-suffering, humble, and kind? The Bible says, “’He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. (I John 4:8)
We can’t say we know God and not walk in love because He is love. If you have Him in you, you have love in you. But the thing is, a lot of us have walked away from love. We respond from selfish interest rather than love. Where we’re supposed to show kindness, we show cruelty. When we’re supposed to show forgiveness, we show retaliation. We use an intellectual calculation to respond to situations that require us to show grace. Look through society today, love is missing or perverted. However, it is not too late, we can return.
Over the next three days, we’ll look at the different areas we’re supposed to return to love. But the first thing you need to ask is,
Lord, help restore to my heart again, love. Let love be stirred up on the inside of me again. Let everything that has to do with me stem from love, including my thoughts and actions when no one is looking. In Jesus’ name.
Amen.
