Thursday, April 18, 2024

Fruit of Spirit – Love

Prayer – Lord God, You are Love. There is no greater revelation within our hearts than this…God is love. Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 1 John 4:7-8 NLT 

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! Galatians 5:22-23 NLT

 

Meditate. Read God’s word and contemplate “love” for God and others.

 

God is love. It’s simple. What other being would create man in His image, breath spiritual life into him, let him make his own choices, and then rescue him when he messes up. Rescue. God gave up His own Son…His one and only Son…so that us rotten humans could be redeemed and come back into relationship with Him. That’s a great god—His is our God. He is love.

 

There are so many places in the Bible that relate love between God and us. The classic description of love is given in 1Corinthians 13. It is always worth contemplating God’s love…and our love for others because, as Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, love is the greatest of all things.


If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn't love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn't love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn't love others, I would have gained nothing. Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless. When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely. Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13:1-13 NLT

We are to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength…and to love our neighbor as ourselves. How that going for you?

 

Verse of Salvation ~ Show us your unfailing love, O LORD, and grant us your salvation. Psalm 85:7 NLT

 

© 2024 Text, photos, and illustrations by Mickey M. Hunacek. All rights reserved. 

All scripture quoted from the New Living Translation (NLT) unless otherwise noted. 

New Living Translation copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. 

Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Biblical search from Blue Letter Bible - http://v3.blueletterbible.org/search.cfm

 

Books by Mickey M. Hunacek

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