The First and the Second

I love that love points to the heart of the gospel, and that when we see it in its essential form, we see the person of Yeshua, his actions, his sacrifice, his very glorious substance. Therefore we believe because he first loved us. Matthew 22:37-40 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” Love is such a grand concept, and its deeply spiritual in nature. Here Jesus gives a beautiful and precise summation of the quintessential expression of the law, and that is the application of Love! Perhaps one of the most profound elements of love, its its enduring and seemingly infinite abundance in spirit and in endurance of life. It simply never ends. At the core of love we see two directed paths, from which we are given the essential directive of the law: to Love God, and to love others. We would expect his ideals for family to reflect this grand directive, and indeed we do. Grand ideals of family, social provision and justice, and a valuing of the individual to the created core are woven throughout the book of the bible. It is my hope that this blog will reflect ideals of love and truth. So with that said, lets take a look at love from the perspective of Paul in 1st Corinthians. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.8 Love never ends. From these verses we learn that love is: is patient is kind does not envy does not boast is not arrogant is not rude does not insist on its own way is not irritable is not resentful idoes not rejoice at wrongdoing does rejoices with the truth love bears all things believes all things hopes all things endures all things Love never ends Therefore the man that practices love in one way or another practices these things. They through faith and obedience to Yeshua Messiah practice love. Given that the biblical family is founded on God, and God on love, then it is safe to say that the above traits and tendencies lend incredible validity to true biblical manhood.