“…love one another fervently with a pure heart,…” 1 Peter 1:22b
How would you rate the love you have for other people? Do the words “fervently” and “pure” in the above verse stand out to you like they do to me? Do I really love fervently (intensely) and with a pure heart (a heart purified by obedience to Christ)? This standard for love leaves most “love” we are familiar with as far inferior in quality and quantity. In the 1700’s John Gill studied this passage deeply and made these conclusions. “…this is Christ’s new commandment, and the evidence of regeneration; a distinguishing badge of Christianity, and without which all profession of religion is a vain and empty thing; this should be mutual and cordial; and should proceed from the heart, and from an heart sprinkled from an evil conscience; and should be with warmth and fervency, and not with coldness and indifference; though the word here use…may not only design the intenseness of it, but the extensiveness of it also; as that it should reach to all the saints, the poor as well as the rich, and the lesser as well as the greater and more knowing believers;…”
Please join me this Thursday morning as we encourage one another to love as God directs and other topics as well from 1 Peter 1. We will begin our discussion with question 2 on page 16. Reagan comes every week to care for your little ones, so don’t hesitate to bring them along. As usual Livestream will begin about 9:30.