How Do You Define Love? - Josh McDowell

http://youtu.be/OPsEGbpXX6M

Josh McDowell gives the definition of love. More from Mcdowell on love:
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5zP2y...

How Do We Love God? With Simon Brace.

Special Guest Simon Brace joins us once again and answers the question "How do we Love God?" Recommended Book: "Love God with All Your Mind" by J.P. Moreland. http://www.amazon.com/Love-Your-God-All-Mind/dp/1576830160

The Extent of God's Love (John MacArthur)

Love: A Feeling, or Action? (1 Corinthians 13:1-3) John MacArthur

The thirteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians may be, from a literary viewpoint, the greatest passage Paul ever penned. Among many other things, it has been called the hymn of love, a lyrical interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes set to music. Studying it is somewhat like taking apart a flower; part of the beauty is lost when the components are separated. But the Spirit's primary purpose in this passage, as in all Scripture, is to edify. When each part is understood more clearly, the whole can become even more beautiful.

Agape (love) is one of the rarest words in ancient Greek literature, but one of the most common in the New Testament. Unlike our English love, it never refers to romantic or sexual love, for which eros was used, and which does not appear in the New Testament. Nor does it refer to mere sentiment, a pleasant feeling about something or someone. It does not mean dose friendship or brotherly love, for which philia is used. Nor does agape mean charity, a term the King James translators carried over from the Latin and which in English has long been associated only with giving to the needy. This chapter is itself the best definition of agape...

The Greatest of These is Love

by Kirk M. Wellum @http://redeemingthetime.blogspot.com

Last weekend I was asked to speak at a wedding on 1 Corinthians 13. I suspect that almost everyone who has been to a Christian wedding knows that 1 Corinthians is about love. It tells us that love is absolutely essential (vs.1-3), that it expresses itself in many practical ways (vs.4-7), that it is tied to ultimate, eschatological realities (vs.8-12) and that it is the greatest of all spiritual gifts (vs.13).

However, it often comes as a shock to people when they discover that the apostle Paul is not writing about love in the context of marriage, but in terms of people getting along with one another in the local church. In fact, the "love chapter" comes in the middle of a section on spiritual gifts and how they are to function in the life of the people of God. Thus in the immediate context love 1) binds everything together - it gives cohesiveness and unity, 2) facilitates human interaction - it brings peace, harmony and understanding, and 3) makes our actions complete - without love nothing is acceptable and pleasing to God. This is not to deny the connection between love and marriage but merely to note the biblical context of the chapter.

But beyond the individual chapter, and 1 Corinthians as a whole, it is important to see that 1 Corinthians 13 is part of a much larger story. It begins in the book of Genesis and goes all the way through to the book of Revelation. It is the story of the establishment of God's kingdom in a world that rebelled against him. A story that is centered in Jesus Christ. Unless you understand this story, you will not understand love. The biblical story is the story of God's love which purifies as it transforms, a love that assumes faith and devotion to God.

When the "love chapter" is located in the larger biblical setting it is obvious that a "1 Corinthians kind of love" can only grow and flourish in a renewed heart. Many people think they want love, true love, but only a few are willing to come to Jesus Christ and allow him to so transform them that they know what it is to love God and one another as they should. If we isolate 1 Corinthians from the salvation of God accomplished in Christ, we cut the power of love at its source. In profound ways, we love because he first loved us (1 John 4:19).

The Love You Don’t Need

By John MacArthur @ http://www.sfpulpit.com

“All you need is love.”

So said the Beatles. If they’d been singing about God’s love, the statement would have a grain of truth in it.

But what usually goes by the name love in popular culture is not authentic love at all; it’s a deadly fraud.

Far from being “all you need,” it’s something you desperately need to avoid.

The apostle Paul makes that very point in Ephesians 5:1-3. He writes, “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.”

The simple command of verse 2 (”walk in love, as Christ loved us”) sums up the whole moral obligation of the Christian. After all, God’s love is the single, central principle that defines the Christian’s entire duty.

This kind of love is really “all you need.” Romans 13:8-10 says, “The one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments . . . are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.” Galatians 5:14 echoes that selfsame truth: “The whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Jesus likewise taught that all the law and the prophets hang on two simple principles about love—the First and Second Great Commandments (Matt. 22:38-40). In other words, “love . . . is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14, NKJV).

When Paul commands us to walk in love, the context reveals that in positive terms, he is talking about being kind, tenderhearted, and forgiving to one another (Ephesians 4:32). The model for such selfless love is Christ, who gave His life to save His people from their sins. “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). And “if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11).

In other words, true love is always sacrificial, self-giving, merciful, compassionate, sympathetic, kind, generous, and patient. These and many other positive, benevolent qualities (cf 1 Cor. 13:4-8) are what Scripture associates with divine love.

When Love Is Bad

But notice the negative side as well, also seen in the context of Ephesians 5. The person who truly loves others as Christ loves us must refuse every kind of counterfeit love. The apostle Paul names some of these satanic forgeries. They include immorality, impurity, and covetousness. The passage continues:

Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous ( that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not associate with them. (vv. 4-7)

Immorality is perhaps our generation’s favorite substitute for love. Paul uses the Greek word porneia, which includes every kind of sexual sin. Popular culture desperately tries to blur the line between genuine love and immoral passion. But all such immorality is a total perversion of genuine love, because it seeks self-gratification rather than the good of others.

Impurity is another devilish perversion of love. Here Paul employs the Greek term akatharsia, which refers to every kind of filth and impurity. Specifically, Paul has in mind “filthiness,” “foolish talk,” and “crude joking,” which are the peculiar characteristics of evil companionship. That kind of camaraderie has nothing to do with true love, and the apostle plainly says it has no place in the Christian’s walk.

Covetousness is yet another corruption of love that stems from a narcissistic desire for self-gratification. It’s the exact opposite of the example Christ set when He “gave Himself up for us” (v. 2). In verse 5, Paul equates covetousness with idolatry. Again, this has no place in the Christian walk, and according to verse 5, the person who is guilty of it “has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.”

Such sins, Paul says, “must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints” (v. 3). Of those who practice such things, he tells us, “Do not associate with them” (v. 7).

In other words, we are not showing authentic love unless we are intolerant of all the popular perversions of love.

Most of the talk about love these days ignores this principle. “Love” has been redefined as a broad tolerance that overlooks sin and embraces good and evil alike. That’s not love; it’s apathy.

God’s love is not at all like that. Remember, the supreme manifestation of God’s love is the cross, where Christ “loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (v. 2). Thus Scripture explains the love of God in terms of sacrifice, atonement for sin, and propitiation: “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10). In other words Christ made Himself a sacrifice to turn away the wrath of an offended deity. Far from dismissing our sins with a benign tolerance, God gave His Son as an offering for sin, to satisfy His own wrath and justice in the salvation of sinners.

That is the very heart of the gospel. God manifest his love in a way that upheld His holiness, justice, and righteousness without compromise. True love “does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth” (1 Cor. 13:6).

That’s the kind of love we are called to walk in. It’s a love that is “first pure, then peaceable” (cf. James 3:17).

Unconditional Love?

By Doug Barnes @ http://www.banneroftruth.org

We hear a lot about unconditional love these days “Jesus loves you, no strings attached,” etc. Does God love unconditionally? Can Christian parents love their children even if these children do not wish to walk in God’s ways?

In a popular children’s video series, each show ends with one of the main characters telling his viewers, “God made you special, and He loves you very much.” That statement reflects a now common assumption that God is the embodiment of love, bearing no hint of hatred, condemnation or disapproval.

You do well to question that assumption. Because no matter how warm and fuzzy it may make people feel, it doesn’t reflect the reality of what God has revealed about Himself.

But first, let’s recognize that the Bible does emphasize God’s love. With 1 John 4:16, we confess: “God is love.” Likewise, “We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19), recognizing that God did so love the world that He gave His only Son (John 3:16).

Yet God’s love is not unconditional.

For not only is our God loving, He also is just and righteous. Ps. 5:4-5 reminds us that our God is “not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers.” And Ps. 11:5 says that with His very being, God “hates the wicked and the one who loves violence.” The God who is merciful, gracious and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness is the same God who “will by no means clear the guilty” (Exod. 34:6-7).

So to speak of God’s “unconditional” love is misleading. While He does show favour to all men — for instance, with the rain that waters our land and the food that fills our mouths (Acts 14:17) — His love requires the atoning sacrifice of Christ. Only through His perfect life, atoning death and triumphant resurrection can we be reconciled to God and saved from His wrath (Rom. 5:10). Only by Christ can we be redeemed from the curse that our lawlessness deserves (Gal. 3:13). Only by the love that sent Christ can we be rendered holy and blameless before God - and, in this way, be made able to receive God’s wholehearted love. So there is a condition to God’s love, and that condition is Christ. Of course, He promises His love to all who profess faith in Him, along with their children (Gen. 17:7; Acts 2:39). But if our profession is false, and in reality we lack faith, we make ourselves covenant-breakers who are cut off from God and His love. So there also is a condition on our part — but a condition met only through the work of God’s Spirit, who unites us to Christ and His merits. Again, the condition of God’s love is Christ.

What of Christian parents? Can we love our children “unconditionally”? Well, yes and no. We should always strive to love our children, just as God loved us enough to send Christ even "while we were still sinners” (Rom. 5:8). And that love ought to cause us to long for nothing less than their restoration to God through Christ (Gal. 6:1).

For young children, such love demands not only hugs and compliments, but discipline and instruction. For adult children who depart from God’s ways, true Christian love may require us to support the elders who bring Church discipline toward them, or even to withhold some expressions of parental love to keep them from mistaking our love for support of their sinful lifestyles. However, those are hard decisions to make. They call for much prayer and the counsel of trusted Christian advisors.

Our prayer should always be that our children’s souls might be restored to God (Jas. 5:19-20) — a desire that should capture us because Christ has delivered us, and now His love dwells in us (1 John 4:7 ff.). So once more, our love is conditional only upon the gracious love of Christ, who poured out His love on the cross to deliver us — and to cause us to reflect His love to others.


Rev. Doug Barnes is pastor of Hills United Reformed Church, Canada.

How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways

From Bob Kauflin @ http://worshipmatters.blogs.com

This morning the Washington Post business section ran a column called, "To Me, With Love: Retailers Embrace Valentine's Day as an Excuse for Singles to Celebrate Themselves." Among other interesting facts, the article reports that Piperlime, an online shoe store owned by Gap, has a "Be your own Valentine" category. Sales are strong for Valentine's Day gifts you can give to the person you love the most - yourself.

You may not have the nerve to give a Valentine's gift to yourself, but you're probably no stranger to self-love. There is an appropriate way to humbly acknowledge that we are "fearfully and wonderfully made" (Ps. 139:14). However that is worlds apart from our therapeutic culture which views low self-esteem as the worst of all evils. We're told we don't love ourselves enough. In contrast, God warns that in the last days people will be "lovers of self" (2 Tim. 3:2). From God's perspective, we love ourselves too much.

I've been using The Gospel Primer, by Milton Vincent, in my private devotions, and the section I read this morning happened to address this very issue. The author points out that self-love is rooted in at least two lies. The first is the lie that no one can love me better than me. If I don't love myself, who will be left to give me special treatment, watch out for my comfort, and protect me from danger? Who will buy me presents I don't have to return? A second falsehood is the belief that no one is more worthy of love than me. That lie leads me to think excessively about how people view me, and to react sinfully when people ignore, criticize, or forget me. "I deserve better!" is the common refrain of a self-consumed heart.

In specific ways, the Gospel liberates us from the lie, lure, and lameness of self-love. First, it shows me God's love is better than mine. "The Gospel assures me that the love of God is infinitely superior to any love that I could ever give to myself. 'Greater love has no one than this,' says Jesus while speaking of His love" (p. 33). My fickle, sin-stained, temporary love will never compare to God's eternal and unchanging displayed in the atoning sacrifice of his Son. Do I think I can love myself better than God can or does? If so, I'm grossly deceived.

Second, the Gospel shows me that God is more worthy of love than me. "The gospel reveals to me the breathtaking glory and loveliness of God, and in so doing, it lures my heart away from love of self and leaves me enthralled by Him instead. The more I behold God's glory in the gospel, the more lovely He appears to me. And the more lovely He appears, the more self fades into the background like a former love interest who can no longer compete for my affections" (p. 34). I can be tempted to think that I should be loved more. But if I'm in Jesus Christ, I can't be loved any more than I already am (Rom. 8:38-39)! No, God is the one who should be loved more. I should spend my time making sure that people love God, not me.

Every time we gather to worship God is one more opportunity to confront the idol of self-love. We should proclaim that we exist to love God as our duty and delight. We should gladly confess that God's steadfast love extends to the heavens (Ps. 36:5) and that the love of Christ surpasses all knowledge (Eph. 3:19). We should acknowledge that this is the way we know love: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us (1 John 3:16). He gave himself as our substitute, securing our redemption and adoption, and overcoming the powers of hell and the grave.

Meditating on God's perfect and holy love for his people will cause us to see how great God himself is, and cause us to love him more. Do you leave the Sunday meeting in awe that God loves you? You should! It is a glorious truth that Christ loved me and gave himself for me (Gal. 2:20). But the fact that God loves me is only part of the good news. I am not the end of the Gospel. God is. And he has freed me from the bondage of loving myself so that I might love and enjoy him forever. THAT is great news!

So don't get yourself a Valentine's Day present this year. Or any year. It's our privilege to demonstrate to the world that we know the Savior who loves us like no other, and who is worthy of our love for eternity.

Speaking the Truth…in LOVE!

By Dan Edelen @ http://ceruleansanctum.com

Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ…
—Ephesians 4:15 ESV

It’s one thing to speak truth. Any dimestore prophet standing on a streetcorner in an urban jungle can speak truth. That deranged guy shoving his poetry—only $2.00—in your face as you walk down the sidewalk can spout truth. A club-tie-wearing teacher commanding the front of a pasty-white classroom in an exclusive private school in Chevy Chase, Maryland, can instill truth. That young Hispanic lieutenant who saw the military as his way out of the barrio can yell truth at his soldiers.

You, me, our children—any of us can spew, whisper, and scream truth.

But only Christians speak truth in love. Because we know Love.

Which is why there’s no excuse for Christians to speak unlovingly to anyone. We do not speak fear, because in love, there is no fear.

God ordains that love be the envelope that holds His treasured words when we speak truth to others. When we preach, our message is love and our delivery is, too.

And when we confront error, it is not in anger, but in love. We rebuke lovingly, humbly, and gently:

Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.
—Galatians 6:1 ESV

Lest you too be tempted. Because we are dust.

The mature understand this. The immature rail and accuse, showing no love, no humility. No image of Christ, into whom we are to grow.

Paul again:

For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.
—Galatians 5:13-15 ESV

How easily we fall into biting and devouring. Even now ministries composed of misguided people gnash and consume in an attempt to one-up each other in their mastery of what they believe to be truth. And it brings disgrace upon the name of Christ. Because there is no love in it at all. One side may very well be correct in their understanding, while the other succumbs to mistaken notions. However, everyone is at fault when love gets trampled underfoot, because love is the ultimate expression of what it means to walk in Christian maturity:

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
—2 Peter 1:3-8 ESV

The culmination of a God-pleasing lifestyle? Love. All those other godly traits serve as the bedrock upon which love rests.

I knew a man unlike any I’ve met. Gifts of the Spirit flowed out of him like water. But more than the power by which he ministered in Christ’s name, he loved. No person he encountered proved unworthy of his love. He gave love to everyone, no matter how small or important. And because his love flowed so readily into other people’s love-starved lives, when he spoke truth, people listened. He’d earned the right to be heard because he led with love. Even when he corrected others, they listened and obeyed because he’d already won their respect and admiration because he loved before all else.

When someone speaks hard-to-bear truth to you, would you rather they lead with love or lead with accusations?

I believe one of the most under-lived truths of the Scriptures today comes from an all too familiar Scripture:

And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.
—Luke 6:31 ESV

When we must hear truth, how do we wish it delivered? If we say, “With love,” do we speak truth to others the same way? Or do we bludgeon sinners and opponents, only to expect they use kid gloves with us?

It feels miserable to be on the receiving end of a tirade, doesn’t it? Tongue-lashings hurt, but they’re simple to yell, aren’t they? Any loudmouth can shout truth in our faces.

But to deliver a message in love isn’t easy. It demands we actually care in tangible ways for the people we speak truth to. It costs us something. It asks for genuine relationship. It means reaching out as one human to another.

And the greater truth of speaking the truth in love is the only person fully qualified to speak truth to another person is the one who fulfills this Scripture:

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends.
—John 15:13 ESV

If we’re not prepared to die for the people we speak truth to, then we should let others less infatuated with their own lives speak it instead.

Humbling. Speaking the truth comes with a price. When we fail to love before we speak truth, we come under the condemnation of the Golden Rule. We have not loved, therefore we should not expect love in return:

For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.
—Matthew 7:2 ESV

Angry accusations beget angry replies. Biting. Devouring. And our anger burns hotter.

Here is truth:

We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
—1 John 4:19-21 ESV

Nothing we do in the name of Christ comes apart from Him. Without Him we can do nothing. So when we minister out of any spirit other than love, we minister out of the flesh. The words we then speak scorch like strange fire, not the sweet, life-giving warmth of the Spirit.We Christians cannot say we love God if we do not love our brothers and sisters. Loving them means speaking truth. And the only way to speak truth is in love.

It’s costly. It’s demanding. It takes work. It asks the Spirit to blast away our easy, fleshly responses. Yet it speaks life, the very Spirit of our Lord.

The Jesus Love Revolution

Posted by Dan Edelen @ http://ceruleansanctum.com

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.
—2 Peter 1:5-7 ESV

Whenever I hear some smug sourpuss exclaim, “The word love isn’t mentioned anywhere in the Book of Acts,” I want to scream.

Why? Because the entire book is love! And not just Acts. Same goes for the other sixty-five books.

Sadly, the sourpuss understanding predominates in some of our churches. Too many Christians live as if love were the most foreign word in their vocabularies, and they’ll use any excuse not to say it, much less practice it.

This last year, if a lesson wrought in my life by the Holy Spirit has stuck more than any other, it’s this: Lead with love. Always.

And I’m not talking about tough love, because so-called tough love is the excuse of too many Christians to be tactless and self-righteous. I’m talking about this kind of love:

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends.
—John 15:13 ESV

Look who laid His life down for us, the ones He calls friends. Look who wept bitterly at the tomb of His dear friend, Lazarus. Look who purchased for Himself a Bride, a perfect, perpetual lover, one He bought with His own blood!

We sell Jesus short (and ourselves along with Him) when we give such short shrift to love.

God so loved us that He sent Jesus, whom He loved in divine fellowship with the Holy Spirit, to show us how to love perfectly. By love, Jesus served us, and died on a cross, choosing to prove His love for us and for the Father and the Spirit, by offering up His life. And from that spilled blood rose His Bride, the Church, whose entire language and practice is steeped in love.

No one had seen anything like that Bride. Jerusalem was shaken by this band of people whose first act after receiving the loving gift of the Holy Spirit was to ensure by love that none among them lacked for any good thing. That the orphan and widow, the two lowest forms of life in that society, be loved and served because God loved them beyond what any human could understand. The orphan became the child of God and the widow a bride! Because of love!

That group of believers loved so intensely they thought nothing of their own lives save that they through faith love their Lord unto death, facing a cross of their own for reaching out to anyone who did not already know their Lover. And when they flagged, their leaders roused them with these truths of love:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
—Ephesians 2:4-7 ESV

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.
—1 John 3:1a ESV

Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved.
—Philippians 4:1 ESV

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
—Colossians 3:12-14 ESV

And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ,
—Philippians 1:9-10 ESV

You see, when Jesus Christ came, He brought a love revolution. The Jews were scandalized by this rabbi who loved tax collectors, whores, beggars, and even Roman scum who oppressed their nation. He loved the unlovable, and by that love forgave the unforgivable.

His birth was a sacrificial act of His own love.

His first battle with evil proved His unwavering love for the Father and for us, His mission.

His first miracle was an act of love for a couple in love.

His first public reading of the loving words of the Father attested to His love for those society deemed unlovable.

He delayed His love for a friend to show an even greater love that proved His love not only for His friend, but to His Father.

By His perfect love, His service to us was our model of love.

He only spoke the truth, and that because of His love.

Love empowered both His death and resurrection.

And when He spoke of the people He would love forever, He spoke of them as a Bride, the very image of love.

That Bride not only shocked the callous hearts of the Jews, people who had once understood the love of God (but who could not see when Love walked among them), she destroyed all pretense behind the false love shown by the pagans. For if the pagans thought they knew love through their religious sexual carnality and temple prostitution, the unblemished love Christ showed through His Bride shook their worlds. This was not a perverted love that loved only the young, strong, and beautiful, but also the old, weak, and ugly. The Church spread like wildfire through the Roman Empire, historians wrote, because the Christians loved people everyone else left to die. And an entire empire stood up and took notice.

Holiness didn’t make the rest of the world stare in amazement. No one was holier than the Pharisees. Doctrine didn’t make people wonder what this new sect was. No one knew their doctrine better than the Pharisees. When the last of the Pharisees exhaled for the final time, all their supposed holiness and doctrine amounted to not one whit of salvation wrought for the Kingdom of God.

Because they had no love.

Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
—1 John 4:8 ESV

In closing, the Bible says this:

Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
—Ephesians 4:15-16 ESV

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities–all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell….
—Colossians 1:15-19 ESV

If we are to grow up in every way into Christ, then because He is Love, our entire reason for being is to love. For if the universe is held together in Christ, He holds it together in love, because that is what He is, and that is what we are to be as well.

The Peter passage that opens this post says it all. Everything we are about as Christians culminates in love. Love is the fulfillment of what it means to follow Christ. As the Lord of Love replied when asked which command is greatest:

“The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
–Mark 12:29-31 ESV

In everything, lead with love.

Always.