Volume 6, Issue 2, October 1996

LOVE IS SOMETHING YOU DO

Jesus' ministry was short but extraordinary because of his witness to the power and healing of love.
St. Paul caught the significance of this and declared, "and above everything else, be truly loving, for love binds all the virtues together in perfection." (The Letter of Paul to the Colossians, Chapter 3, verse 14).
The apostle John wrote, "The person whose life is lived in love does, in fact, live in God." (The First Letter of John, chapter 4, verse 16).
It was Jesus himself who said, "By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (The Gospel According to St. John, chapter 13, verse 35).
The very heart of the Christian faith is love, for as St. John declared, "God is love." (The First Letter of John, chapter 4, verse 8).
John had already stated, "let us love not merely in theory or in words; let us love in sincerity and in practice."
This love that Jesus witnessed was so fulfilled it caused the early Christians to coin a new word for it. They called it, in Greek, "agape", love greater than the ordinary. Agape may be translated as "Christian love."
Jesus lived this love. He meta man dressed in rags, who smelled to high heaven. He was covered with lice. He was repulsive. Jesus was repulsed by the man's terrible conditions, but he reached out his hand and helped him.
Love is something you do.
The Good Samaritan was an outcast in his society, a half-breed pariah in the eyes of the Jews, but he was the one who helped the wounded man by the side of the road.
Love is something you do.
Modern humanity has the means to overcome most of our social ills, but we lack love. As one person put it: The question of my own bread is material. The question of my neighbour's bread is a spiritual matter.

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"Religion NOW" is published in limited edition by the Rev. Ross E. Readhead, B.A., B.D., Certificate of Corrections, McMaster University, in the interest of furthering knowledge and participation in religion. Dialogue is invited and welcomed.