The most important thing we can do is learn how to love. Loving God is most important but loving others is next in line (Matthew 22:37-40).
KEY VERSE
“For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Galatians 5:14 NIV
God wants us to love everyone but particularly those in His family, our fellow believers (Galatians 6:10). Loving our brothers and sisters in Christ is important because it is our greatest witness of God (John 13:35). We are most like God when we love and when we love we live as we were meant to.
We develop love through fellowship with others and from fellowship we learn three truths.
THE BEST USE OF LIFE IS LOVE
Loving others is our greatest commandment and should be our priority. Why should it be our priority? There are three reasons.
LIFE WITHOUT LOVE IS WORTHLESS
Love is what brings meaning to life, without love life is dull. Relationships and love are what truly matter, they bring colour into our lives but we often take them for granted and don’t invest our time in our relationships so we lose them. We get busy or something more urgent always takes priority and slowly our relationships die. Life without love sucks, but life with love is fulfilling.
“If I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.” 1 Corinthians 13:3 CSB
LOVE LASTS FOREVER
Love is eternal. Love is the cause of life and is there at the end. In most cases it fills the moments in between too. There is no greater legacy to leave than love. Love leaves a mark more than any achievement.
On the deathbed what is most people wish they had? More money or success? No, they wish they had spent more time with the people they love. Love matters more than anything don’t wait until it’s too late to realise this.
“Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love – but the greatest of these is love.” 1 Corinthians 13:13 CSB
WE WILL BE EVALUATED ON OUR LOVE
In the end everything will pass away, everything except our souls. All we have is our faith and character. God will judge our character and measure our spiritual maturity on how we love and on the quality of our relationships. Love is important to God therefore it is important to us.
“And the King will answer them, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” Matthew 25:40 CSB
THE BEST EXPRESSION OF LOVE IS TIME
We are all conscious of time and how short it can be yet we also take it for granted that we will live to see another day. Tomorrow is not promised.
How we spend our time shows what we value, and what we invest our time in reveals our priorities. But when we remember how fleeting life is we often see that our priorities are wrong. God is our priority, living His way and loving the best we can is our goal.
“Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in action and in truth.” 1 John 3:18 CSB
God wants us to value our relationships and we must prove that we do by investing our time in them.
The essence of love is in how much we give of ourselves. When we want to be loved we ask for undivided attention, which is the greatest gift we can give because it shows we care and involves giving up some of our precious time. Time is the best gift we can give.
Whenever we give time, we sacrifice something and that sacrifice is the essence of love.
We can give without love, but we cannot love without giving. To love is to yield or give with no expectations of that love being returned.
THE BEST TIME TO LOVE IS NOW
We can’t procrastinate on love, we don’t know how much time is given to us (Proverbs 3:27). We should make the most of the time we have (Ephesians 5:16) and love as God would have us do. We should love with every fibre of our being. Love God, love people, love animals and the earth. Love everything except sin and the works of evil.
Life is all about love and we take it for granted that we have time to share love. Let us not forget our impermanence and obey the greatest commandment to love God and people.
How can you love someone today? How can you learn to love better?
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Wholeheartedly Faithul 
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