Love Requires a Relationship

God commands us to love as He loves. It isn’t an option. It cannot be avoided. Anything other than love reveals the lie in our hearts. Consider today’s Epistle Reading:

St. John's First Universal Letter 4:20-21; 5:1-21 (RSV) - Beloved, if any one says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.  And this commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should love his brother also. Every one who believes that Jesus is the Christ is a child of God, and every one who loves the parent loves the child.  By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.  For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.  And his commandments are not burdensome.  For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith.  Who is it that overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? This is he who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not with the water only but with the water and the blood.  And the Spirit is the witness, because the Spirit is the truth.  There are three witnesses, the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree.  If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater; for this is the testimony of God that he has borne witness to his Son.  He who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself.  He who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne to his Son.  And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.  He who has the Son has life; he who has not the Son of God has not life. I write this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.  And this is the confidence which we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.  And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the requests made of him.  If any one sees his brother committing what is not a mortal sin, he will ask, and God will give him life for those whose sin is not mortal.  There is sin which is mortal; I do not say that one is to pray for that.  All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin which is not mortal. We know that any one born of God does not sin, but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him. We know that we are of God, and the whole world is in the power of the evil one. And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, to know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ.  This is the true God and eternal life.  Little children, keep yourselves from idols.  Amen.

I bring this up today because I think it often comforts me to think that Christians have struggled from the very beginning to ‘walk the walk’ and ‘talk the talk’ of belief in Christ. Our battle against the devil isn’t new and the Church has a two thousand year track record of overcoming the struggle. Readings like today, if we have ears to hear and eyes to see, can serve to inspire us to either keep up the battle or get back into the fight.

Great Lent, which begins in just a little over a week, is our chance to get back into the battle. This coming Sunday the Church will remind us of the coming judgment. Let’s not wait until it is too late to fight back.