Tuesday, September 19, 2023

LOVING EACH OTHER

 Jesus said the second most important commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. The New Testament has a lot to say about love between believers. 

For example, 1 John 4:7 says: 

"Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does to love does not know god, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent in only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loves us and sent his So to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loves us, we also ought to love one another."

One of the signs of genuine conversion is love for each other. There should be no room in the church for hate, enmity, antagonism, backstabbing, gossip, and ill treatment of brothers and sisters.

It is also not possible to say you love a brother or sister in an abstract sense, but are mean to them or talk bad about them behind their back. Paul makes it clear that the fruit of the Spirit, which every believer has, is love. (Galatians 5:22) In contrast, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions and envy are fruits of the flesh, not to be manifested by believers.

Paul even tells us what this love looks like. It's patient and kind, not envious or boastful, not arrogant or rude, not irritable or resentful, and not insisting on its own way. (1 Corinthians 13)

If our lives do not demonstrate this kind of love, it is time for some self examination leading to confession and repentance. Imagine how wonderful our fellowship would be if love dominated all of our actions. 

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