LOVE

God is Love and the commandment which He says is the greatest commandment of all gives us the instruction to love. In Mark 12: 29-31, Jesus said, “The most important commandment is this: ‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength’. ‘The second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.”

The secret to loving is not in rules. It is in relationships. Our neighbor is anyone who has a need and we have the ability to meet that need. Jesus is our “Good Samaritan” and we are to be “The Good Samaritan” to others. The love that we receive from Christ should be passed through us. They will know that we are Christians by our love as we reflect Christ and His compassion to others.

The story of the Good Samaritan is found in Luke 10: 25-36. The story was told by Jesus in response to a young lawyer. He questioned, “what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus answered by telling him to love God and his neighbor. The lawyer asked, “who is my neighbor?” Jesus used the story of the “Good Samaritan to answer his question. This story shows us that genuine love always requires risk, compassion, contact, care, and cost. You cannot love someone without it costing you something.

Love in Scripture:

1 John 4:19 : “We love because He first loved us”

Psalm 103:11 : “For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His steadfast love toward those who fear Him.”

Psalm 108:4 : “For your steadfast love is higher than the heavens, and your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.”

1 John 4:9 : “God showed how much He loved us by sending His only Son into this world to bring to us eternal life through His death.”

John 15:13 : “Greater love has no man than this; that a man gives up his life for his friends.”

1 John 4
1 Corinthians 13

Love and Law merge in The 10 Commandments. Jesus came to fulfill the Law
We are not to have love without law (The 10 Commandments give us God’s moral law)
We are not to have law without love (as the Pharisees did)