SCRIPTURES

John 14:21

Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.” 

Revelation 2:4-5

Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place.

What does it mean to love the Lord?

True love means to love something or someone more than anything or anyone else. As it says in the Scriptures, “Anyone who loves me will hold and keep my command”. If you love the Lord, you have to listen to his words and take action on them with all your heart, will, and life. This is the essence of love. To do that, you need to take action while being one with the Holy Spirit’s thoughts and the Lord’s thoughts, and you need to make it your joy to love God, the Holy Spirit, and the Lord.

Sow seeds of love

In order to receive love, you first have to give love. Love is the seed of the entire world. Even if there is a field and a farmer, nothing happens without the seed; if you want to eat potatoes, you first have to plant potatoes. You reap what you sow. So you must sow love. If you plant love together with God, then it will become perfect, Godly love.

Overcome hardships with the power of love 

We encounter so many difficulties and hardships throughout our lives. But with love for God, the Holy Spirit, and the Lord, you can overcome anything. The greatest power of all is the power of love. And the most powerful person in the world is a person who has true love for the Trinity. Always take action with that greatest power. Even when you get discouraged, by loving God you can gain hope. If you love and do things together with the Lord, then you will keep his commands, even if it’s hard, and be victorious in life. It’s a mission that one cannot do without love.

You learn about love through the Word, but love isn’t a subject you can master just by knowing it in theory. You learn about it by putting it into action. Every day, you should witness love, learn about love, and practice love. Even if you pray, read the Bible, and take action in big ways, the reason you achieve success in life is ultimately because of love. In this way, the Messiah also succeeded because of love.

Salvation is achieved through love 

You cannot go to the eternal world of love—Heaven—if you don’t have love. Even if you have fame, power, and beauty, you cannot receive Heaven. Only those who love the Trinity and the Lord, and who listen to the Word and live by it, can enter into Heaven. The heart of loving God cannot be rivaled by beauty. It’s the beauty of faith. A truly beautiful person is someone who has a strong, clear mentality in the Word. 

Salvation isn’t just achieved by the Lord’s giving the Word of life; it is gained by his giving the Word and pouring out his love. You should experience this by caring for people in your everyday life. Love God, the Holy Spirit, the Lord, your brothers and sisters, and even your enemies. It’s not enough to just share the Word, but you have to engage in the true love of God and love people in that way; then it becomes spiritual love. 

What kind of love fulfills the Purpose?

Looking after people simply out of responsibility won’t work out. It is care that is done with love that gives life and hope. Parents would get worn out right away if not for the love they have for their children. For trees, water is like love. Trees become beautiful as long as you continue to give them water. But just as trees turn yellow at the top when they are dying, people die when their thoughts and hearts change because this leads to wrong actions. You have to truly love people and do things for them.

For many people, love is only physical. But physical love is not everlasting and it cannot fulfill God’s Purpose. If you love someone, you should pray for them, give them the Word, help them, forgive them, and comfort them in times of difficulty. When you pray for someone, you help them overcome Satan. As long as there is someone who truly loves them, they will be saved. This is sincere, true love—spiritual love. It’s the way that God loves. You engage in this kind of love by receiving God and the Lord’s mentality. Since this is what God wants you to do, He’ll be happy and bless you even more.

Maintain your first love for God

Many people love God, love the Lord, or love other people, but they gradually lose that feeling of first love. There are many reasons why a person’s love cools. In the course of living your busy life, you may forget to love God, so gradually your love fades away. But if you don’t regain that love, then like moving a lampstand, God will move His love elsewhere.

Some people’s love cools because of tribulations. But tribulations will arise throughout your entire lifetime. Remember that they are only temporary. The ability to overcome tribulation stems from your own mentality and thoughts, and how you act on them. The vice of human beings is that even when we know something is good for us, we can’t always do it. You have to change your mentality and make it your constitution through consistent effort and practice. Furthermore, in order to achieve fundamental change, you have to do it out of love; then you’ll do it even if you don’t like it. Tremendous things happen with the power and love of God, the Holy Spirit, and the Lord.

God’s Purpose of Creation is love

Things that require tremendous effort can’t possibly be done without love. Thus, the purpose for which God created the world was to love human beings and for human beings to return that love to the heavens. If you don’t love, you can’t fulfill the purpose for which you were created. This means that you must live loving creation, loving people, loving the Creator, and loving the Lord who came to save us.

All God’s creation was made as the foundation for love, so your first love should be towards the heavens. God is the fundamental Creator, and the Lord is the re-creator who recreates us through salvation. Furthermore, without love God would not have made it possible for us to live eternally in Heaven. But for the sake of love, God created our spirits and saves us through our spirits so that we can live with Him forever. God did everything for us because He loves us, so you must also do everything for God because you love Him. 

But whether it’s creation or people, people often fail to love properly. In 1 Corinthians 13 it says that if there is no love, everything ends as nothing. Love all the time and at every occasion; love as much as you sleep, and do it every day. Even when raising a dog, if you treat it well, it’ll treat you well too. It’s the same when growing a tree: if you raise it with love, it will grow to be big and beautiful. You have to live a life of love for both those on Earth and in Heaven. Live your life centering on love.

Know the value of love

The value of something rises according to how much you love it; something that you earnestly love is priceless. Therefore, without love there is no value or satisfaction in life. 

Even the value of a person is determined by how much they love. If you consider people who have achieved great success, there is nobody who has not loved. Either they loved a subject, loved nature, loved people—they loved something. They could not have succeeded without love. The same is true with faith. Without loving God, without loving yourself, or without loving your brothers, you cannot achieve success. What kind of success? Spiritual success, which is the most important. Physical success such as making lots of money or living in a big house is secondary, but when the right time comes, God will give that to you as well.