1 John 4:7-12
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.
John 15:9-17
Jesus Teaches Us to Love One Another
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.
Love for Enemies
43 "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
God is LOVE...So as we read about God Being LOVE then we can certainly believe that since we are made in His image He wants us to love Him, our neighbors, and ourselves...God has given us free will which allows us to make our own choices...And these choices often come down to love and kindness...Free will allows love and it sadly allows hate...Free will allows us to be bad and it allows us to be good...And it is free will that allows us to take the destructive path of evil...
Through this Unconditional LOVE of our Father, we can love as much as we want or we can also sadly be as evil as we want...And we see love and evil and love and hate play out through the world each and everyday...
But to follow Jesus and to show others that we are His Disciples, then we are to love one another...Love gives us the power that the world needs to make it a better place...When you really love someone you can learn to forgive them, despite the little or even large disputes and disagreements you have...But when Jesus told us to love our enemies, I believe that He raised the bar on love...He doesn't want us just to read right through this teaching or even just gloss over it...He wants us to look at love as love different than we normally do...This teaching goes to the very heart of love and the reasons behind love...So we are reminded in His teaching that we have a choice to love our enemies or not to love them...Free will makes it possible for the world to get better through love, or to get worse through hate...It is the choices on love and hate that we each make everyday that either makes this world a better place or a worse one...
If somehow the each of us loved every enemy, the world would have no enemies...