Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13:4-13 English Standard Version (ESV)
God is love. If we become confused by the Word of God about who or what we are to love, we simply must remember our Creator and who He is. God demonstrates His love for us with every breath we take. He also knows who and what we love and all the things we treasure most in His gift of life to us. He has inspired this definition of love to be revealed clearly to us in His Word. Love is the characteristic of the image of God in which we were created that we are commanded to emulate. Jesus, the Word made flesh, gave us specifics through His proclamation of the two greatest commandments and their order. Christ calls us to love God first and then each other (Matthew 22:37-39). Many other things will beckon for our devotion and affection, but they will all slip through our fingers.
Since love is all we have to hold onto in this fallen world, we need to make certain it is truly God's love we are holding onto. Everything else is temporary. Love never ends. Hearts filled with love will be the only thing we can take with us when our time on earth is done. Our judgment relies upon the inventory of love we have stocked up in our hearts for God and our fellow man. Our eternal life depends on it.
Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Romans 12:9 NLT
Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:8 NIV
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