Day 31: Faith and Love

Dear friend,

The kind of love that God requires from us comes only from one thing in our lives – and that is faith.

Some people tend to exalt love at the expense of faith. Their attitude is, "The only thing that matters is love. Don’t talk to me too much about faith." But that’s illogical and inconsistent. Not that love isn’t the supremely important thing, but because love of this kind can come into our lives and be expressed through us only by faith. Faith is the essential prerequisite for enjoying and manifesting this kind of love.

This is what Paul says in Galatians 5, verse 6:

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. [I believe Paul there takes circumcision and uncircumcision as being outward religious acts. And he says, ‘By themselves outward religious acts have no value unless they’re joined with love.’ And then he goes on to say in the same verse:] The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.” (NIV)

That’s very sweeping. "The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love." We must never divorce faith and love. You see, we can say we have faith and be proud of our faith, but if it doesn’t produce love, it’s really worthless in the long run. Or we can lay all our emphasis on love and say, "Love is what really matters," but we must not overlook the fact that the only way to this kind of love is faith. There’s no other way to reproduce God’s love, but by God’s faith.

So if we just keep on telling people you must be loving, you must love one another, but we do not put in their hands the key of faith, then we just frustrate them. You cannot have God’s love by trying. In fact, in general, love does not come by trying. This is a simple, but very profound, fact.

Suppose I were to say to my dear wife, "I’m really trying to love you." Do you think she would appreciate that? I don’t. Why not? Because trying to love a person is really a confession that you don’t love them. And trying to love people generally is a confession we don’t have the love of God. It does not come by trying.

How does it come? By faith. Faith, if it’s God’s faith – through the new birth, releases in our hearts and lives the love of God, and there is no other way to that love.

For reflection and prayer

The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.