Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.
God's love was revealed to us in this way: he sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins.1 John 4: 7-10
Love - it is among the most overused and misunderstood words in our language. Yet when correctly understood, it is the most important thing in our life, for it is the sole purpose of our existence, and the only thing that can fulfill us and bring us happiness.
Love has many spurious meanings. Enter the keyword love into any search engine to see how many things go by the name of love. Many things feel like love, but most are cheap imitations of the real thing. So how can I know that something that looks and feels like love is really love?
I know that love is real when God is present in it. For love in its purest meaning is the unconditional relationship of grace that God entered into with us when he created us. Love is synonymous with God, and it is the deepest source and wellspring of our being.
Love is the force that draws things together in a world that is continually torn apart by alienation and discord. It always acknowledges the inestimable worth of each person as a child of God. It always seeks what is good, and it always promotes a more deeply human life that finds its fulfillment in God. If it does not lead us to God, it is not love.
The only way we can be sure our love is real is to give it away. The greatest lesson in love ever given was in the person of Jesus Christ. By his life and death he showed us how God loves. He taught us that the greatest love is to lay down one's life for others. He showed us that it is by dying to ourselves for the good of others that we find love.
This kind of love usually does not feel good, and most of the time the world rejects it. But it is the only real love, the only one that will bring us happiness, and the only one that will lead us to fulfillment in the kingdom of heaven.
Father, so great is your love for us, that you gave us your only Son, that we might believe in him, and be led to eternal life. We give you thanks for so great a love. Shine the light of your truth in the darkness of our world, and guide us along the way to eternal life.