1 John 4:7-21
God's LOVE and Ours
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.
God's eternal power and Divine Nature can be seen through creation in the things we can see and other things we cannot seem...So God has made things both visible and invisible in creation...
Let us love one another, for love comes from God...Love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus...We love because God first LOVED us...We see love in this world because God is LOVE...We see beauty in this world, because God made the world and universe God...We know morality because God created Morality and He is Completely Moral...We believe then in righteousness because God the First of the Righteous Ones...We see those things of love, joy, peace, patience, faithfulness, goodness, gentleness, kindness, and self control surrounding Him, because He is the make of all things both visible and invisible...These are the Fruits of His Spirit, and they all come from God...Yet, we cannot tangibly see these different Fruits of the Holy Spirit...These Great Virtues are invisible to the eye, yet are seen from the heart...
Theologist N. T. Wright wrote, “God is the one who satisfies the passion for justice, the longing for spirituality, the hunger for relationship, the yearning for beauty...And God, the true God, is the God we see in Jesus of Nazareth, Israel's Messiah, the world's true LORD.”...