This is almost everyone's favorite passage...
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This is almost everyone's favorite passage whether we live it or not, and it should be embroidered and hung in every home! That one word L-O-V-E is the most important word in the Bible. The law of God is summarized in the words, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind and love your neighbor as yourself." Jesus also says, "This is how they will know you are my disciples, that you have love for one another."
When a scientist tells me that he can't believe anything that he can't put in his lab and test, I have to point out that the most important thing in all the world can't be examined in a lab -- and that is love! With all that scientist's wisdom and knowledge, if his wife or children were killed, would he calmly replace them and go on? If love is not real, why do we want to choose our own mate to spend our lives with? Why do we want to choose our own friends? We don't choose our parents, but we would not survive without their love.
Compare love to wind. You can't see wind. You can only see what it does. You can see it move leaves and trees. It even has the power in storms to move cars and houses! You can measure the velocity of wind, but you can't put it in a bottle and take it into the lab. Yet it would be foolish to say it doesn't exist! That is true of love also!
The word for God's Spirit is also the word for breath or wind. Without love we can't say we have God's Spirit in us.
If you want to know if God's Spirit is in you, read that epistle chapter carefully, word for word, and then ask if there is that kind of love in you.
Jesus says that we have love for those who are our friends and family, but one great test for love is if we even love our enemies! The whole world would change if everyone had love at the center of his or her life! Let it begin in you and let your family and friends see it and even those who you may be upset with. Memorize that passage and let it be the center of your life. Remember that God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son. What else can we say?
When a scientist tells me that he can't believe anything that he can't put in his lab and test, I have to point out that the most important thing in all the world can't be examined in a lab -- and that is love! With all that scientist's wisdom and knowledge, if his wife or children were killed, would he calmly replace them and go on? If love is not real, why do we want to choose our own mate to spend our lives with? Why do we want to choose our own friends? We don't choose our parents, but we would not survive without their love.
Compare love to wind. You can't see wind. You can only see what it does. You can see it move leaves and trees. It even has the power in storms to move cars and houses! You can measure the velocity of wind, but you can't put it in a bottle and take it into the lab. Yet it would be foolish to say it doesn't exist! That is true of love also!
The word for God's Spirit is also the word for breath or wind. Without love we can't say we have God's Spirit in us.
If you want to know if God's Spirit is in you, read that epistle chapter carefully, word for word, and then ask if there is that kind of love in you.
Jesus says that we have love for those who are our friends and family, but one great test for love is if we even love our enemies! The whole world would change if everyone had love at the center of his or her life! Let it begin in you and let your family and friends see it and even those who you may be upset with. Memorize that passage and let it be the center of your life. Remember that God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son. What else can we say?
