“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:34-5).
If you were to summarize the entire Bible upon one verse of Scripture, which verse would you have epitomized it? On what solid foundational ground can such bold declaration be situated? Given its level of difficulty, this very scripture keeps resonating in my spirit: “For God so loved the world (mankind) that He gave”(John 3:16a). The Apostle John in his epistle gives us a sneak peek into God’s divine nature and characteristic. He tells us: “God is love” (I John 4:8,16). John didn’t say that God “has” love but rather that He “is” love. If God is love, then His actions would naturally or supernaturally be revealed by the nature of love. One obvious qualities of love that we can attest to is that it “gives and shares itself.” Giving and sharing of itself means it cannot dwell in a vacuum. Therefore, the very nature of God Almighty would be to desire to share His sovereignty and power. In essence, love is fulfilled when it gives and shares itself—the reason and totality of Christ’s passion for the cross.
Our world is mourning and wailing, searching for that precious gem of love. Just look around, pick up a newspaper or turn on your television set. The unveiling of history everyday is as a shattered beautiful mosaic. With all of our great universities, cyber-space technology, World Wide Web, media psychology, G-8 meetings, immigration reform and policies, medical revolution, religious conferences, democracy, cease-fire and peace marches, mankind is still his “own worst enemy.”[1] The undeniable facts of blood-shed, rape, poverty, starvation, violence, genocide, bombings, corporate corruption, moral decay, sexual revolution, human trafficking, terrorism, theft, substance abuse, divorce, racism, and so forth are evidences etched on the archives of history, evident that the human soul is still in mourning. There is a hunger in the human spirit that food cannot satisfy; it is a thirst that mere water cannot quench. This desire emanates from a “vacuum created by a loss of something man use to possess.”[2] Driven to pursue answers, “generations [from yester years up-to-date] have attempted to [fulfill this desire by means of] superstitions, sophisticated [religious] rituals, customs and practices that seem to defy logic and reason;”[3] however, all have come to no avail. If anything, they’ve actually escalated and intensified the problem(s).
Just look at our world as we continue to make progress. We’ve actually become “smarter but not wiser, healthier but weaker, [we save] whales [and dolphins] yet kill our own children”[4], our public schools once a place of prayer and moral values has become a haven for demons.[5] The United States expenditure on drugs annually has exceeded that of oil. How did this happen? How did the land of the free and home of the brave become the world’s number one addict? We have money and class, but are losing our children to drugs and gang violence. We have the best security systems in the world yet, our schools are under serious scrutiny as mass murders and killings continue to ravage our campuses. “The average 12-year-old girl is sexually active;”[6] and a mother’s womb, once a place of safety and comfort has now become a holocaust for innocence. And with marriages ending in tragic divorce, children have become the innocent casualties of a war within the home. While television has become the official day care system, video games are deceitfully applauded as the new childhood drug.[7] We have more baby-daddies and babe-mamas than we have fathers and mothers. We can live with our pets longer than with spouses, our cars last longer than our marriages, our children shoot their teachers, and our kids murder their friends. What kind of world are we living in? The 21st century man is nothing more than a sophisticated caveman. He doesn’t carry a club he carries an automatic weapon. And though he can change his environment, he cannot change his nature. He is still the same since Genesis chapter three.[8] The search for knowledge and understanding without God has left him (man) with a spiritual cancer—frustration.
To solve this bull of a problem, we need to grab it by its horns. We are made in God’s image and if that image is love, then I believe we’ve just found the solution to our problem(s). Upon accepting Christ, the Spirit of love (that nature of God in man that was lost due to sin) comes back to have residence in our abode. And “because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Romans 5:5) we are chosen to go forth and radically dress the wounds of a hurting world with the antidote of God’s infectious love. Jesus said, “By this [network of love within the cluster of believers] everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:34-35). For three straight years Jesus sowed in their hearts the seed of love. When the seed germinated and came to fruition on Pentecost, it wasn’t a surprise that three thousand plus hungry souls were fed. The Bible went on saying that they were so fulfilled that, “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved” (Acts 2: 42-47). When the world sees the love network among us (believers) in how we reach out to one another, encouraging and supporting each with care and compassion, the bridge of hope will be extended to give others a new way of life. As we continue to fan the flames of this magnetic love of God, many would be sucked in by its attractive power. We are God’s network of love; therefore, be radical.
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