Love is the Fulfilling of the Law
ON GOD; Part XC
“Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world. Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world. They are of the world: therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them. We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error. Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment . He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also” (1 John 4:1-21).
From our verse in the last post: “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him“, we made some observations about Love which is a subject that we deal with frequently and this because it is the single most important part of True Christianity and one that is much of the time hidden behind the veil of doctrine and dogma and behind the veil of illusion and glamour. Part of our observation, which we will continue with today, was the reality of the Apostle John’s statement that “God is love” and from this we set forth this statement which it would behoove us all to read and to understand:
Careful reading of the words of the Master should only tell us one very important thing and that is that we as men in form, as conscious personalities, are to express this same Love in all that we say and all that we do on this Earth and it is when a man can do this that he will be in the fullness of the God Within and a disciple of the Christ in the Kingdom of God.
Our words here say that this is the only thing and the reality of this statement is that ALL of the Master’s teachings come from this perspective and we again must repeat here that His idea of Love, the Love that IS GOD, is not the attractive principal that is ordinarily at work here in the Earth; it is a universal principal of cosmic proportion and, as the apostle tells us, it is the very NATURE OF GOD. The Master breaks this idea down for us and tells us the importance of seeing Love in ways other than the way it is commonly appreciated by man; as ones attractive Love for wife or husband, children and parents, friends with whom we have some relational link and such things as give us comfort in Life as to love the car or the house or baseball. All these things God Love is not and the Master tells us this by telling us that if we wish to be worthy of Him and the Kingdom ,which we see also as the Christ Within that is ever in the Kingdom, that we must be willing to give up these things of the Earth. For clarity let us look at some of the Master’s words that tell us this:
- From the Gospel of Matthew: “He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me” (Matthew 10:37-38).
- From the Gospel of Luke: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath , he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26-27, 33).
- From the Gospel of Mark: “Then Peter began to say unto him, Lo, we have left all, and have followed thee And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s, But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life” (Mark 10:28-30).
Can we understand that in these words of the Master that all things of the Earth, no matter how important one may think that they are, must be left behind in discipleship and do we understand from the entirety of the Gospels and the whole of the New Testament that the objective of every man is to step out of his little Life in this world and to step into Life in the Kingdom of God as a True disciple of the Christ. And, can we grasp from His parables that ALL this, ALL the Good, ALL the Beautiful, and ALL the True, is to be found in His Kingdom which He tells us is within us ALL. What prevents a man from Truly seeing this is the illusion and the glamour by which we are deceived. More importantly that this is the reality of the Love that IS GOD for it is in this True Love that we can understand what it means to forsake ALL and it is in this True Love that we can see what is Truly important to the Christ, to the Christ Within and to the Great and Awesome Plan of God.
In similar fashion we should understand that the Master came among us saying: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10) and in this there is much misunderstanding regarding just who it is that is lost. This saying follows Jesus’ encounter with Zacchaeus, the publican who, because of our indoctrination, we see as an evil man in need of saving; however, can we not see that this man as a Jewish businessman and not too much unlike the businessman of today and that he is looked down upon by the self-righteous and religious Jew. Without going too far into this idea today, let us try to understand who it is that is lost; that it is everyone who is not Truly following the Master and that those looking down at the publican and speaking badly of him are likely even more lost than Zacchaeus. Such is the nature of the parable. So, as we continue on with the rest of our thoughts on this verse from the Fourth Chapter of the First Epistle of John, let us reflect again on our saying on Love and then upon our definition of this Love as we see it taught by the Christ and which should be our way of Life here on this Earth.
Careful reading of the words of the Master should only tell us one very important thing and that is that we as men in form, as conscious personalities, are to express this same Love in all that we say and all that we do on this Earth and it is when a man can do this that he will be in the fullness of the God Within and a disciple of the Christ in the Kingdom of God.
In a general sense Love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men.
As we said yesterday, we have discussed much of the content that appears in this verse in previous posts so today we will focus upon the first part which is “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us“. It is hard to say what it is that the apostle is saying here and, as this part is found between two sayings which are rather identical but stated differently, there may be some relationship. In the prior verse John says that “God dwelleth in him, and he in God” which he attributes to confession and at the end of this one he says “he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him” which is of course speaking of Love. Where then is the identical nature or these? When we discussed this word confess we came upon several things which tell us that the common understanding of it is not right for its incompleteness; we found that Vincent led us to see that the basic idea is the same as is found in abide in and dwell in and we expounded upon the examples that he gave. We discovered that the Master’s use of the idea of confessing Him can not be limited to that verbal assertion of His divinity but that it must be more and neither can His confessing of us be seen in that frame of reference. We can KNOW this by His telling us that it is not enough to consider Him Lord or to call Him as such; He tells us clearly that we must still do the Will of the Father. This is not however how doctrine sees this but that is of no importance as we are here discerning the Master’s words away from doctrine which tells us these things and we repeat some of His words here briefly:
- “Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men , him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 10:32).
- “Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men , him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God” (Luke 12:8).
Here we find the fundamentals of doctrine which, when we turn the Light upon the word confess takes on a different meaning. Vincent told us that: the idea is that of confessing Christ out of a state of oneness with him. “Abide in me, and being in me, confess me.” It implies indentification of the confessor with the confessed, and thus takes confession out of the category of mere formal or verbal acknowledgment4. And this we take from the Master’s own sayings such as “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21); Vincent tells us here that the true confessor of Christ is one whose faith rests in him4 and we take this yet further into His telling us that one must “doeth the will of my Father“. We can see here the synonymous nature of the quaternary of ideas: believe in Him or believe on Him, follow Him, Keep His words and confess Him. The first and the last are the way that this idea is framed in the New Testament; the middle two are our own understanding of the words from scripture and for us these all mean the same thing and it is in doing this thing that one can “dwelleth in God, and God in him“. We should remember here another saying that should take us to the understanding that to confess the Lord in not enough; He tells us that “And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46).
So we can interpret the saying in our prior verse as to say that “Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God (keep His word, follow Him), God dwelleth in him, and he in God“. The other part of our two verses is in regard to Love but it is framed a bit differently than we have heretofore seen, the apostle tells us that if we dwell in Love, then we dwell in God and God in us. Now in this idea we have come up with our own understanding which says:
Live in Love, Live in God
Live in God, God Lives in us
This can be seen as the fullness of Life and the fullness of keeping His words; it is here, in Love that all things meet. Love can be the fulfillment of ALL for when we Truly “dwelleth in love” we will find that there is no other choice but to keep ALL of His words and to do the Will of the Father. What do we mean by no other choice? simply that we would not look for any alternative for in this Love ALL things are resolved. Can we see here now the identical nature that we spoke of above between the ideas of to “dwelleth in love” and to “confess that Jesus is the Son of God“.
Getting back to our point of the beginning of the apostle’s thought being sandwiched between these two sayings on dwelling in God and He in us, we are still looking to them to help us to discern the meaning of the saying at hand: “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us“. Can we understand this as John’s speaking to those who KNOW the depth of the Love of God, to those who do “dwelleth in love” and who do “confess that Jesus is the Son of God” and who do also comply with the earlier versions of this same thought? Can this saying be meant to bring to the attention of all who read this that there are those who “have known and believed the love that God hath to us“? This is a likely scenario. While the commentators do not treat these thoughts with any depth, Vincent does give us some idea of “love that God hath to us“; he says:
- The love which God hath. On this use of e]cein to have, see on John 16:22. Compare John 8:35. Looking then at John 16:22 we find this to help us understand the idea of ‘have’ in our subject verse:
- Have sorrow (lu>phn e]cete). This form of expression occurs frequently in the New Testament, to denote the possession or experience of virtues, sensations, desires, emotions, intellectual or spiritual faculties, faults, or defects. It is stronger than the verb which expresses any one of these. For instance, to have faith is stronger than to believe: to have life, than the act of living. It expresses a distinct, personal realization of the virtue or fault or sentiment in question. Hence, to have sorrow is more than to be sorrowful. In Matthew 17:20, Christ does not say if ye believe, but if ye have faith; if faith, in ever so small a degree, is possessed by you as a conscious, living principle and motive. Compare have love (13:35; 1 John 4:16); have peace (16:33); have trust (2 Corinthians 3:4); have boldness (Hebrews 10:19; 1 John 2:28.
- We add to this his thoughts on the last words “to us” where he says that To us (ejn hJmi~n). Rev., in us. Compare God abideth in Him.
Vincent’s ideas say that this refers more to the Love that God has in us which is the way this is translated in the Revised Standard Version and others as well. How then shall we see this idea, that God has Love in us? If we take our first supposition, that John is speaking to them, himself included, who KNOW and believe the depth of this Love to those who do follow Him and keep His words, then this last part makes sense from the perspective that the Soul IS that same Love of God as is the Christ and that Soul and that Christ Within is IN US. This it may be easier to understand with the next verse which we will cover in the next post.
Note on the Quote of the Day
This daily blog also has a Quote of the Day which may not be in any way related to the essay. Many of these will be from the Bible and some just prayers or meditations that may have an influence on you and are in line with the subject matter of this blog. As the quote will change daily and will not store with the post, it is repeated in this section with the book reference and comment.
We leave the Quote of the Day from yesterday for another day. The words that accompanied this in the last post are a part of this mantram in the Prayers and Meditations section should any want to reference them.
True Love and True brotherhood starts with each man as an individual; it is he who must become color blind and blind to the customs and religions of different people. When we can see men as brothers and understand that the reality of each is in his Soul, his Christ Within, which is trying, as are we, to express that divinity through form we have then come far. We would then understand that some are far from this goal of expression as we were at one time also and it is with this idea that the Master gives us His commandments on Love and tells us that we, as aspirants and disciples, must take the lead in this world and that lead must be evidenced by the fruit that we bear. We will marry these thoughts to some of the Master’s words in the next post.
When we realize our essential divinity, that we are all Spirit manifest in Life as Soul, as the Christ Within, we will then look at ALL men as the same, as ONE together and as one with each of us. This realization is the first goal and it is this realization which is the Love of the Soul working through the conscious personality. We are reading and writing these things and therefore we likely have this realization but how do we spread it? how do we make it contagious? Simply by the way we act and react toward our brothers and our neighbors, by our steadfast expression of GoodWill.
The sons of men are one and I am one with them.
I seek to love, not hate;
I seek to serve and not exact due service;
I seek to heal, not hurt.
≡
Let pain bring due reward of light and love.
Let the Soul control the outer form, and life and all events,
And bring to light the love that underlies the happenings of the time.
≡
Let vision come and insight.
Let the future stand revealed.
Let inner union demonstrate and outer cleavages be gone.
Let love prevail.
Let all men love.
We have studied this mantram before in some detail (In the Words of Jesus parts 84-87) and since this is quite a while back we should revisit some of the ideas that we discussed. This idea of Unification is one that is founded in the reality of the Fatherhood of God and, at the same time in the Brotherhood of man; these terms should be seen as inseparable. The 1913 Webster’s definition of unity is To cause to be one; to make into a unit; to unite; to view as one1 and this is the idea that we should take to heart; not only in this mantram but in ALL of the teachings of the Master for if we do look intently enough there is nothing but unity is Jesus words. This of course is all a very personal thing as is all else that is spiritual; each man must take it upon himself to SEE all humanity as ONE essential reality….as ALL sons of the ONE GOD who says that: “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rainon the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:45) and within this thought we must see also that there is not reckoning of color or of nationality or of religion as there are good and evil in each of these and just and unjust as well.
- 4 Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition, 1888
