The Statement

“We know that we have passed from death unto life,
because we love the brethren”
1 John 3:14

The evidence of Christ’s resurrection life in our hearts is love. Love is more than an emotion, more than a sentiment, it is the very essence of God. The vastness of the love of God is an ocean one can never pass over. It is a love that transcends knowledge. Paul in his prayer for The Church at Ephesus prayed that they would be strengthened by grace in order

“…to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge,
that you may be filled with all the fullness of God”
Ephesians 3:19

The way to be filled with God is to grow into the Love of Christ. Love is the power and the faculty by which He unveils Himself to the human heart. Love sees humanity clearly. When Christ hung on the cross amidst the jeers and the mocking of the crowd He saw beyond the animosity of the moment into the deep pain of their condition.

“Father, forgive them;
for they know not what they do”
Luke 23:24

That same love gives us the capacity to see past the injuries of relationships with His people; it empowers us to see past the rejections and disputes of our brothers and sisters and into the causes of them. In Love’s sway we first begin to all deal with the unholy and carnal roots within our own hearts. Love is never blind. Christ on the cross was the eternal proof of the depth and horror of our sin. God’s love sees all and responds. So it is in our lives: love is to become the springboard for our responses to the situations around us. The Love of God being formed in us is the power to live in Him; from this perspective we find the overwhelming need to abide in Him.

To actually love “in deed and in truth” is the revelation of the extent of Christ’s life in us.

“My little children, let us not love in word,
or in tongue, but in deed and in truth”
1 John 3:18

It is incumbent upon us to weigh our life in the light of His truth.

“Lord, make me to know mine end,
and the measure of my days, what it is;
that I may know how frail I am”
Psalm 39:4

Jesus took on our frailty that we might live in the power of God; our poverty becomes the portal for His strength.

Brian Troxel