Galatians 5:22-23 “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”
The MacArthur Study Bible: “Love. One of several Greek words for love, agape is the love of choice, referring not to an emotional affection, physical attraction, or a familial bond, but to respect, devotion, and affection that leads to willing, self-sacrificial service.”
1 John 3:16-18 “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.”
1 Corinthians 13
”If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”
Those last verses are typically used for weddings, but they are really the clearest definition of the love all believers should have for each other. Love is ultimately the end of being consumed with self, and looking towards serving God and others. It isn’t solely emotion, but a caring heart backed by action.
As we grow in Christ, our love should continue to grow as well, becoming more and more like God’s love, whose depths are nearly indescribable.
*The Love of God
“Could we with ink the ocean fill,
Or were the skies of parchment made,
Were very stall on earth a quill
Or every man a scribe by trade:
To write the love of God above
Would drain the oceans dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole
Though stretched from sky to sky.
The love of God,
How rich and pure,
How measureless and strong;
It shall forevermore endure
The saints’ and angels’ song.”
*Fredrick M. Lehman
This week, look for ways to serve others, be kind, and exemplify a heart of love for the Lord.
The Misplaced Mom 
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