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THE LOVE OF GOD
Audio: by Fred R. Coulter
Introduction
God's Love Toward Us:
God's Love Toward Us
The love of God is revealed in that the God Family created mankind in
Their image and Their likeness and gave them dominion over the entire earth, which They
had bountifully created for them. God the Father's profound spiritual love is fully
manifested to mankind through His overall plan as revealed in the New Testament in the
life, death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ. In His supreme love, God the Father
offers every human being the opportunity to be born into the God Family through the
resurrection from death, becoming a literal child of God the Father, with the same form
and spiritual composition as God the Father and God the Son. God's love and reconciliation
is now extended to those He is calling, and will be extended to all mankind according to
His plan. God the Father's love is manifested toward those He has called now through His
grace and mercy which He daily bestows through Jesus Christ, His continuing intervention
and blessings, and the care with which He chastens them.
Scriptural References:
| Deut. 4:37 |
John 3:16 |
Rom. 5:7-8 |
| I John 3:1 |
Psa. 145:8 |
I John 4:8-10, 16 |
| Heb. 12:6 |
John 16:27; 14:21 |
Eph. 2:4-10 |
Our Love Toward God:
We love God because He first loved us. Our love for God is a result of
God the Father's calling through the power of the Holy Spirit, which opens our minds to
understand the greatness and goodness of God's love and the sinfulness of our own nature.
God the Father leads us to genuine repentance and acceptance of the sacrifice and blood of
Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins. We manifest our repentance and our faith in
Jesus Christ by being baptized in water, symbolically burying the old self into the death
of Jesus Christ and rising to walk in newness of life. Through the laying on of hands, the
gift of the Holy Spirit is given to us as a spiritual begettal from God the Father,
imparting the love of God into our hearts. The capacity to truly love God comes through
His Spirit within us. We are individually to love God the Father and Jesus Christ with all
our heart, all our mind, all our soul, all our strength and all our being. Jesus said that
anyone who does not love God more than all others is not worthy of Him. Our love and our
complete devotion to God the Father and Jesus Christ are manifested by our willingness to
live by every word of God and to keep all His commandments.
Scriptural References:
| I John 4:16-19; 5:2-3 |
Mat. 22:37-38 |
Eph. 5:1-2 |
| Rom. 5:5 |
I John 2:5, 15 |
II John 6 |
| John 14:15-24 |
Gal. 5:22 |
Psa. 97:10 |
| Deut. 6:5 |
Deut. 13:3 |
Mat. 10:37-38 |
Love Toward Our Neighbor:
Love Toward Our Neighbor
Our Love Toward Brethren:
Our Love Toward Brethren
Christians are to have a special love for one another because God the
Father and Jesus Christ have individually called and personally love each one. As the
begotten children of God, with the Holy Spirit shed abroad into their hearts, all true
Christians share a special fellowship with God the Father and Jesus Christ. This
fellowship is the foundation for the new commandment which Jesus gave to His disciples to
"love one another as I have loved you." This true Christian love is a sign by
which all people can recognize the followers of Jesus Christ.
Scriptural References:
| John 13:34-35 |
John 15:9-10 |
I John 3:16-17 |
| I John 2:6-11; 5:1-2 |
I John 4:19-21 |
II John 4-6 |
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