1 John 4:7-8 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
I have mentioned more than once the billboards I’ve seen before that say: “Just love everyone. I’ll sort them out later. ~God” To me, that idea is the heart of God’s message, Jesus’s message: Just love everyone.
1 John 4:9 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.
Oftentimes that’s easier said than done—loving everyone. We have to love past our own issues and past the other person’s. But I truly believe that at the heart of most issues is the deep need to be loved and accepted—warts and all, faults and all, unlovableness and all. We all need love. And God is love personified.
1 John 4:10-11 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
Lord, Your commandment—love everyone—is so easy, but absolutely not simple. Life, pride, grudges, so many things get in the way of loving others. Help us to see the simplicity of what You ask of us. Help us to make love our default, no matter how difficult it is. Help us to love as You love. Deeply, lavishly, completely. Amen.
1 John 4:16b-17 …God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 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.
Have a blessed day. I love you.