A Jot from John
Love: The Crowning Grace
“If ye fulfill the royal law. . .” (James 2:8). The law of love is a regal law. How clearly enunciated it was by the king of kings! (Matt. 5:44; John 13:35). The law of love extends the scepter. The law of love wears the crown. Of all the graces that man can define and practice, love is the crowning virtue. Of the full array of those human qualities which God smiled upon and blesses, the capacity to love pleases our heavenly Father most (1 Cor. 13:13).
Love Is the Crowning Grace Because It Makes Us More Like God
There are qualities (virtues) that distinguish God. These qualities are a part of Him as our qualities are a part of us. The virtues of God are numerous, and each quality which He possesses is complete and absolute. In His nature, He is just and righteous. He possesses all power and knows all things. However, even in our limited understanding of these qualities of God, there is one quality which describes Him more clearly than any other. God is just, but God is not called justice. Love is so much a part of God that “God is love” (1 John 4:8).
Love Is The Crowning Grace Because It Embodies Much Of God’s Will For Man
From God’s nature there emerges a will for man. This is the heart of Divine law. Whereas it is a law that is made for man and is surely the course of blessedness, God’s law springs from the nature of God himself. As God is love, God’s will for man in the New Covenant is founded upon love. “Herein is love, not that we loved God but that He loves us . . .” (1 John 4:10). Knowing this quickens man’s capacity to love. In fact, no other human response to God’s will is adequate unless the fires of love have been ignited in the heart of a Christian (1 Cor. 13).
Love Is the Crowning Grace Because It Makes All Virtues The More Appealing
A man can be honest but so self-righteous in his honesty that others are repulsed. Only a capacity to love can make this honesty radiate and appeal to others. Not only does love fuse other virtues but it raises the degree of consistency with which any one quality is exercised.
Love Is the Crowning Grace Because It is The Most Selfless Of All Virtues
Love has been defined as that which “leads us to forget ourselves in investing ourselves in the well-being of another” Thereby “love seeketh not its own” (1 Cor. 13:5).
John B. Daniels, Associate Minister
