Let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
– from 1 John 4:7-8
Christians are called throughout the entire New Testament to love. Love God, love one another, love one’s enemies, love everyone. Love, says Jesus in Mark 12:29-31, is the greatest commandment. Christians are warned against judging others (Luke 13:37-42). Let God sort out what is sin. Don’t condemn others when you don’t have a perfect view of God’s will or his understanding of what sin is. We know only what he has shown us, and what he decides will count. Not your interpretation of his word.
Christians can get very eager to define sin. It comes from a good place of wanting not to do those things God doesn’t want us to do. But we can take it a step too far, become overly legalistic and also push our “rules” onto those who are not Christians. They are not for unbelievers. Salvation is specifically not the result of works (Ephesians 2:8-9), and forcing a nonbeliever to follow Christian rules won’t benefit them. If you are trying to save them, try introducing them to Christ. Try loving them, as Christ did and called us to do.
If Jesus, the model of Christianity, says that Love is what the whole Law and Prophets depend on, the point of the entire Old Testament, it is probably really important. Like, the kind of important that you should base your life on. If you can only do one thing, love. Without it, you and I are nothing (1 Corinthians 13).
We should be concerned enough with loving everyone that we don’t even have time to worry about the speck in another’s eye. We love them and show them that God loves them. They can worry about their own speck. If they are Christian, God will point it out to them in his own time. If not, he will point out how much he loves them regardless of any speck.
Love is not letting evil run rampant. It is not bowing down to tyranny or oppression, it is not servitude to cruel persons. Love is refusing to stoop to their level. Refusing to hate them. Love is showing that person there is a better way. Setting an example even in the face of their assault or harassment. Love does not mean allowing injustice to occur, but it does mean wanting to see the person’s life changed. The goal of love is transformation, and those who are the vilest of people are in the need of it the most.
Christ loved us so much he died for us to remove the weight of our sin. He didn’t look at our imperfections or hate us because we didn’t live up to some standard. He came because we can’t live up to some standard.
Christ loves us in spite of our flaws. We should follow his example and love each other in the midst of all mistakes, shortcomings, and humanness. Me hating you will not help me any. Hate will never improve anything. Only love can do that. Anyone who hates has never known love, and showing him or her what love really is is the only way to reach that person.
