The church is a community where we can love one another, be loved, and find a real sense of belonging. Truly, we all long to belong. People desire to be part of something bigger than themselves. People want to find that place where they experience true community, acceptance, and love.

What is love? Love is the center of everything because God is at the center of everything. “But God shows his love for us in this…in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” It’s all about love!

Love is from God (1 John 4:7-10)

God is the source of love. We must receive love. “Every good and perfect gift comes down from above.” (James 1:17) God is the giver of everything, including love.

The Bible says, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John 4:10) We don’t generate love in our hearts. We receive the love of God, and then we love others. Truly, “God is love” and that love was made manifest when God sent his only Son into the world (1 Jn. 4:8-9)

AW Tozer once said, “The Christian witness through the centuries has been that “God so loved the world…”; it remains for us to see that love in the light of God’s infinitude. His love is measureless. It is more: it is boundless. It has no bounds because it is not a thing but a facet of the essential nature of God. His love is something He is.”

Love is the Fulfilling of the Law (Galatians 5:14)

The Protestant Reformers sometimes spoke of the 3-fold use of the law.

The first use of the law was to be a mirror. The law of God reflects the perfect righteousness of God. The law exposes human sinfulness. We are naked in our sin before the law of God. The second is the restraint of evil. The law can serve to protect the righteous from the unjust through the dread of punishment. The third use is to reveal what is pleasing in the sight of God. That is why the Christian delights in the law of God, because we want to please our Father.

We need the law. Our understanding of the law exposes us in our sin, and drives us to Christ. Love is the fulfillment of the law. (Rom. 13:8-10)

The essence of the Great Commandment is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-39). How many of us could say we love God with all of our heart, mind and strength for even an hour? While we despair of ourselves, Jesus fulfilled the law of God. He loved God the Father in this way. That is why we look away from ourselves, and to Jesus, in faith.

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