Christians are called to experience and manifest the love of Christ. You cannot manifest what you have not experience. Christians experience the love of God in their hearts at salvation and also at times of affliction. It’s impossible for an unsaved person to manifest the love of Christ. Throughout Jesus earthly ministry, we see the manifestation of the love of God in Jesus life. The love of God constrains Jesus to be obedient to His Father’s will and pay the ultimate price of salvation which is death on the cross.
What God ask of those who believe in Christ and receive His salvation is devoted love (Duet. 6:5; Rom. 13:9-10; 1 Cor. 13). Jesus in Matthew 22:37-39 summed up all moral obligations in the word love, expressed in the twofold direction of God and neighbor. The quotation in verse 37 is from the Jewish Shema (Duet. 6: 4, 5), which all Jews repeated twice daily.
Today, the blessed privilege of every child of God is to manifest the devoted love of God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. The first Adam in Eden missed the blessed privilege and responsibility to manifest the devoted love of God. The second Adam fulfilled this blessed privilege lost by the first Adam and, is today bringing back to the position of demonstrating the love of God.
Is there anything as perfect love? Yes, perfect love is love of God and your neighbor as your first and, chief and all-absorbing passion, there would be no room for sin to establish itself in your heart.
HOW DO YOU MANIFEST THE DEVOTED LOVE OF GOD?
- Love God out of wholehearted fellowship ,devotion and obedience (John 3:16; Rom.8:32; 12: 1-2; Eph. 5:1-2; Col. 3: 12-17)
- Love God with all your heart, with all your soul (Personality), and with your entire mind (intellect, will, choice and emotions) (Matt. 22: 37).
- Love your neighbor/all people (Gal. 6:10; 1 Thess. 3: 12), including your enemies (Matt. 5:44). A child of God is commanded to love all true born-again Christian brother in a special way (John 13:34; 1 John 3:11). The believer’s love to his Christian brother, his neighbor, and his enemy must be subordinated to, and controlled and directed by, his love and devotion to God. Love to God is the “first and great commandment” and should never be compromised in our practice of love to all people.
THE IMPERATIVE FACTS OF LOVE IN 1 JOHN:
- Keeping God’s words is the proof that we love God (2:5; 5:2, 3).
- When we love our brother, we will live without stumbling (2:10).
- We are not to love the world or the things in the world (2:15).
- We cannot love the world and love God also (2:15).
- God’s love prompted Him to make us His children through the death of His son (3:1, 16; 4:9-11).
- Loving other believers is a fundamental requirement of the Christian life (3:11, 16, 23; 4:7, 11, 12).
- A failure to love other Christians raises serious questions about the genuineness of our faith (3:10, 14; 4:8, 20).
- Genuine love always results in action-not merely sentimental words (3:17, 18).
- God is the source of all love (4:7, 16).
- 10) Mature love does not produce fear but instead imparts courage (4:17, 18)
- 11) Long before we loved God, He loved us first (4:19).
Conclusion:
The love of God is the bedrock of our salvation, sanctification, restoration, breakthrough and all the goodness of God that awaits every believer in Christ. Our sonship (Being born again), comes out of the love of God for all humanity. Our fellowship with Christ is a demonstration of the obedience and devotion to God. A devoted love for God is heartfelt, valuable and esteem, and cannot be suppressed but manifested always.