When we think or talk about our faith do we focus on our union of love with God or do we focus on lesser matters? Do our hearers understand that God is the author of ultimate relationship or do they feel like we are trying to prove the faith? How do we speak to ourselves about what our faith is about?
I believe our union of love with God in Christ is the grand unifying theme of biblical theology and spirituality. Every element of the gospel is best understood in the context of His desire to be in a strong and loving relationship with us and His desire for us to live in community with fellow believers. He wants to be our Father, our teacher, our lover, and our friend.
Jesus summed this up in Matthew 22:37 by saying that the greatest commandment was to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. Then He said that the second greatest commandment was to love your neighbor as yourself.
Paul teaches that love is the greatest, even greater than faith: I Corinthians 13:9-13 “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” I Corinthians 13:13 (NIV). Paul also stated: “For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (NLT) Gal 5:14.
John sums up Jesus’ commandments by saying: “And this is His commandment: We must believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us.” I John 3:23 (NLT) Notice “commandment” is singular; in other words “this is Jesus’ one commandment”.
These statements by Jesus, Paul and John about what is most important do not include language such as hold fast to truth, increase in knowledge, glorify God, keep the Lord’s Supper, worship God, do evangelism, walk in the Spirit etc. These things are all important and some are even essential but they are not the phrases most used in the New Testament to describe the most important thing.
Love even surpasses faith (which saves us)! Perhaps this is because in the next age we will walk by sight and love, not faith. So when we talk with believers or unbelievers, or when we talk with ourselves, hopefully we can cast a vision of a union of love before anything else.
Part 2 will look at the word “union” and why it is biblical.
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