True Love Does

1 Corinthians 13:1-3--If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Throughout the Bible, we are guided by commandments, and we are told to keep God’s Word.  When Jesus came, though, He told us that the greatest commandment is for us to love God and one another.  We can easily fall into a trap of “being good” by merely following the rules.  For most, it’s not all that hard to check off the box that says “thou shalt not steal” or “thou shalt not murder.”  And when we are followers of the commandments, it can become easy to distance ourselves from those who do not follow the commandments.  We tend to judge them (even if we say we just disagree and that God is their final judge).  The choice itself to disagree is a judgment of them that interferes with our ability to show them love.  Loving other people has very little to do with the euphoria we feel inside.  It’s nothing at all like what the media portrays when people “fall in love” on screen, emotions that are usually portrayed physically.  We’ve come to believe in a myth that love is about feeling euphoric.  Agape love, God’s love, is about showing kindness and serving others, especially others who would reject us.  Others who aren’t necessarily pleasant.  Love is the only thing that can heal the hurt and voids inside others.  As humans, we are all incomplete.  The joy of Christianity is that we have been made whole in Christ Jesus.  We demonstrate that wholeness and express our love for God when we serve and love others.  That message of whole and complete redemptive love can never be expressed when we take a know-it-all attitude about what is “going to happen” on judgment day.

Today as you pray and meditate on His Word, praise God for His perfect love for you and every part of His Creation.  Rejoice that He fills you with the Holy Spirit so that you may extend His Love to the darkest corners of the Earth.  Pray that He would remove any tendencies toward judgment of others so that you might act in love and service, revealing His true and perfect place in your life.