all we need is love- His Love

Love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love.
There’s nothing you can do that can’t be done.  -The Beatles

If the church will not demonstrate a biblical truth, then it inevitably manifests itself in some counterfeit form in the world (hence, the Beatles distorted song on the powerful truth about love.)  Truly, love is all we need– HIS Love is all we need. Our own human-soulish love will only lead to destruction.

But with Christ’s Perfect Love– there is nothing we can do that can’t be done! All things are possible in Him! Perhaps the most seemingly impossible task for us– genuinely loving our enemies.

Before he was the apostle of love, John was a disciple of Love. We too can become Love’s disciple. It is mandatory in fact to walk with God. We must always remember, love is not a mere emotion– it is a Person. The single source for both experiencing and giving true love is Christ Himself. As we personally experience revelations of His love and then give it away– we undergo a supernatural transformation to BECOME LOVE.

John mentions Love at least 50 times in his writings.  We simply cannot dismiss it’s undeniable foundation to fulfilling Christ’s gospel.

To become Perfect Love is the single highest aim we could have in our spiritual walk. This pursuit alone will catapult us into the highest realms of the Spirit. It can only be accomplished through Jesus who is Love Himself.  God’s very essence is Love, out of which all His goodness, mercy, truth, grace and even judgment flows.

All that Christ did while on earth was motivated by Perfect Love.  Imagine that! He did nothing apart from a pure motivation of Love. In our desire to become like Him– in fact, nothing less than the full and perfect stature of Christ Himself– (read Ephesians 4:13 in the Amplified),  we must learn to do nothing, say nothing, think nothing apart from the motivation of His love. It is hard to comprehend. But IT IS POSSIBLE with Christ’s Spirit working in us.

John gives us God’s example of His Perfect Love and His desire for us to follow His way (interesting how these two verses parallel each other in both content and  chapter/verse numeration).

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

1 John 3: 16 Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

There is no higher spiritual calling available to humankind than to become exactly like Jesus Christ, a mirror reflection of His Perfect Love. We must relinquish the pressure for ‘doing’ in these last days, and humbly believe in Christ’s Perfect Love being fully revealed in us. As we behold Him, we shall become like Him.

becoming servants to Love

Ephesians 5: 1-2  Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.

The realm of Heaven is permeated with Love.  The realm of His Spirit is saturated with Love.  Those who will walk with the Lord Jesus must become as He is– Love.

In the book Intra Muros or Within Heaven’s Gates, Rebecca Ruter Springer learns quickly that in Heaven “one’s first thought ever is to give pleasure to others.” But it is not the Father’s desire that we wait for Heaven to walk in this great and selfless Love.  Of what need is that love in Heaven where all is infused with God’s Love?

Rather, it is in this earthly setting, amongst our family, our friends and our enemies that God has us enrolled in His school of Love.  And full graduation from God’s school of Love is possible! One of the greatest lies seeded into the Church over time is that in this life we cannot achieve full perfection and in so doing completely reflect the Lord Jesus . One need only to read the epistles to see this is absolutely not true.  The Lord is returning for a pure and spotless Bride– those who are without spot or wrinkle. The Bride will be made up of a company of those who have willingly surrendered all, received the mark of the bondservant, and become perfected (or fully matured) in Love.

So what is holding us back from this perfection and walking in total love? Our souls. Though our spirits have been reborn, our souls remain captive to our old nature, a strong will driven by selfish desires and emotions and a mind still influenced by the god of this world and not the God of Heaven.  Our soul holds us back from walking with God in the full measure He intended for us– Christ IN us, the hope of glory (Col 1:27).  Though many have found a place in God, God has found His place in only a few.

Those who are inhabited by God Himself, as Jesus was while on this earth, are those who have allowed God’s  holy Love to purify their souls.

1 Peter 1:22 Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, [see that ye] love one another with a pure heart fervently:

The Apostle Peter gives us the simple means by which we actively purify our souls– obediently walking in love.  Our souls are purified only as we obediently walk in the Truth– and that Truth is to fervently love God and each other with all our heart, soul, and strength (Deut. 6:5).

And this can only be done through the Spirit. Our own love is inadequate to walk in love. Often we love out of our own soulish, human love and inevitably we eventually run out of this pseudo-love and afterward feel totally drained and exhausted. Have you ever experienced that?  But when we love through the Spirit, it is His immeasurable and everlasting love that flows through us and we never grow weary nor lose our patience.

You see, Jesus makes it very easy for us to Love even the most unlovable and unlovely– He gives us His Love. All we must do is willingly receive it and allow it to flow through us.  Walking in His Love is actually to earnestly desire a meek and lowly heart like Jesus’ heart and to then  pick up His burden which is light and His yoke which is easy (Matt 11:29-30). The Lord’s burden is one of Love and as we place His yoke of Love upon our shoulders we too become servants to Love. An ox who is under the yoke of his master only does and moves as his master leads. As we become yoked to Love under the careful guidance of our Father, we shall lovingly move only at the leading of His voice, doing only as desires.

Those who have become Love have sincerely asked for it and zealously pursued it. We must do the same. There is indeed no higher aim or destiny in this life or the next than to become Love, reflecting the very image and likeness of the Lord Jesus.

next time, the awesome power of Love operating in our lives.