Created to Belong…
Created to belong and love means that we are inherently designed to
experience connection and love within a community, signifying a deep-
seated purpose to be part of something larger than oneself and to express
regard towards others; this concept is associated with spiritual beliefs,
where the truth is that we are made by God with the inherent capacity for
relationship and love. We are incredibly loved and made for purpose. Our
faith is evidenced in obedience, and we are commanded to love one
another. Faith is intensely individual because no one can force us to
believe anything. God gives to all the measure of faith, however, the
choice to exercise faith is a conscious personal decision. But faith must
be practiced in community. So belonging is marked by obedience to God’s
summons and by the promise and heart of Jesus. This is a supernatural
kind of togetherness, given to believers by the Holy Spirit. It isn’t defined
by how we’re similar to one another but rather by how we overcome the
differences the world around us might use to separate us from Christ.
Jesus offers absolute, unhindered belonging in and through himself. It’s
upward-pointing belonging so that the world may know that God chose us.
This is the gathering.
Our every discourse is to bring us to the knowledge of the only living and
true God. And let us understand this from the beginning - God is love
means, the living, dynamic activity of love has been going on in God
forever, and has created everything else. He is, in every particular
manner, the Creator of man, of all mankind. God made the first man, he
makes every man, He is the former of every man's body and the Father
of every man's spirit. He has made the nations of men, not only all men in
the nations, but as nations in our geopolitical capacity; He is our founder,
and disposed us all into communities for our mutual preservation and
benefit. He made us all of one blood, of one and the same nature; He
fashions our hearts alike. We are descended from one and the same
common ancestor, in Adam we are all akin, so as we are in Noah, that
thereby we might be engaged in mutual affection and assistance, as
fellow-creatures and brethren. Have we not all one Father? Hath not one
God created us? He made us not to live in one place, but to be dispersed
over all the earth; one nation therefore ought not to look with contempt
upon another. For those on all the face of the earth are of the same blood.
The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb. The
bone of my bone, the flesh of my flesh, that becomes one flesh is the
bonding union of love.
Now here is the truth revealed in the narrative…blood does not make the
family, love does. The bonds of love must be our chosen connection. That
is the core idea that is of God, for God is love! And He so loved us that
He gave us His Son. Thereby we are made one in Him by his blood-stained love.
The life is in the blood, and it is because of God’s love that
we have life. Love exists to ensure the flourishing of both truth and life for
all who seek them. More precious than riches, true love is the font from
which all that is good springs. Love is to be preserved and enriched.
God’s people appreciate all forms of love as long as the expression of that
love does not unjustly harm others. No one loves like God without God’s
help. Love is a good gift of God’s common grace meant for our
development. Our love is more than a sentiment – it is a principle. A
principle founded on the truth that God is a spirit and God is love. The
spirit of the Lord's people is a love which is far above selfishness, and is
based upon fixed principles, which should, day by day, be more and more
distinctly discerned, and always firmly adhered to at any cost. Love is the
principal thing! At its core, biblical love is selfless, committed to truth, and
driven by a divine work inside of us. It never happens unless we draw near
to God in Christ. Our belonging is to always be discerned with a practical
self-examination on love. We are "to prove ourselves" by this examination
of love - whether we are something or nothing, in God's estimation, is to
be measured by our love for Him, our love for Christ, for His brethren, for
His cause, for the world in general and even for our enemies, rather than
by our knowledge, or our oratory. Love is the very spirit of the begetting to
the new nature. We are not to understand that one could have a
knowledge of the deep mysteries of God without having been begotten by
the holy spirit of love; for the deep things of God knoweth no man, but by
the spirit of God; but one might lose the spirit before losing the knowledge
it brought him. In the measure of character, therefore, we are to put love
first, and to consider it the chief test of our nearness to and acceptance
with the Lord. Try describing God as a spirit. Try describing God as love.
The measure of our appreciation that God is a spirit and that God is love
will be the measure of our zeal in conforming our characters to His divine
pattern. Biblical love can also be expressed and experienced in any
relationship. That means we must do that which is first; and that is love
toward God, love toward Christ and love for the truth. Love of the truth
comes before love of the brethren every time. In fact, if we truly love the
brethren, we will adhere to the truth at all costs. It is deeper than any
romantic type love enjoyed in the ultimate union of two. Biblical love takes
us even deeper into that wondrous love of God. Our love for one another
models his covenant love for us - a love so zealous to uphold his covenant
with us that he will die for us, even when he had every justification to leave
us. Death is at the center of God’s love for us, and death is at the heart
of all biblical love. We are betrothed by a vow to die to self, for the other
- to keep the covenant at all costs, doing whatever good thing it takes to
serve God’s purpose. This relationship is grounded in deep eternal truths.
This kind of love comes out of who God is. God is love. His very essence
and makeup and character is love defined. Because of this, we must seek
our love for one another from him. In order to love our every family
member rightly, and deeply, we need the love of the Father to be infused
in us. These graces must be produced by the Spirit of love, filling and
expanding within our own heart.
The truth of our image of divinity must radiant a sense of harmony and
eternal love. The night before Jesus gave His life for us, just hours before
He was arrested, beaten, and falsely accused, He gave His disciples a
new commandment – a new commandment I give unto you, That ye love
one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this
shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
Christ tells us to reflect the same kind of love that He would show on the
cross - pure, sacrificial, enduring love. Christ would submit Himself to pain,
rejection, shame, suffering, and death, all to bring people back to the
Creator Father. The love of Christ working in us is the anchor underneath
the rise and fall of every trial we are to pass through. We could never
reflect that kind of love without God’s help. So, God pours His love into us
through the gift of His Spirit, and that love grows in and around us. When
others see that love, they know that Someone special is working through
us. We must serve with love - we cannot survive without it. To be truly a
godly people, we must reflect all of God’s character. We must be just, true,
and righteous, and we must be loving. If we do not love others, we do not
give them a complete picture of God. Love is our choosing to reflect God’s
goodness to others. By God’s grace, we love people, we encourage them,
we challenge them, and we connect them to His truth. But the love of truth
doesn’t necessarily mean attachment. Sometimes it’s best to love from a
distance; to let another grow and develop. This does not mean that love
would treat evil-doers in precisely the same manner as it would treat its
friends. This is why love needs to be firm and inflexible where clear
principles are involved, where valuable lessons are to be inculcated.
There is a time when righteous indignation must be exercised, but it must
be exercised in doing good, and must not lead to bitterness or harshness
toward others whom we would assist or instruct or correct. Sometimes it
is necessary to take notice of offenses on the part of others and to withhold
a certain degree of cordiality; but no hatred, malice or strife should be
manifested. We are never to barter with truth, yet always striving to leave
the door of opportunity open for a full reconciliation as soon as possible.
We must love the truth so much that we embrace it and serve it and stand
up for it, even though this might mean the loss of religious friends and the
loss of the esteem of our relatives and neighbors. In the Lord's estimation,
it is all the same whether we are ashamed of Him or ashamed of His Word;
and of all such He declares that He will be ashamed when He comes to
be glorified in His saints. We will never rejoice in iniquity, but rather we
will rejoice only in the truth. As we love by the power of this Spirit, we
share in the life, death, resurrection, and love of Christ. This love is
something that can only be experienced and expressed by a true follower
of Christ.
God is love, but love is not a god. We do not worship love. God is love,
but He is also holy, just, good, and true. Since true love reflects God’s
goodness, we must study God to know what our love should look like -
and what it should not look like. An appetite for self-aggrandizement,
ignorance, ignoring truth and sin, can, over time, corrupt our “love” into
something hurtful. From God flows all grace, goodness, and truth. To truly
love others, therefore, we should connect them to the goodness of God.
We should comfort and encourage them with the truth. We should help
them understand God’s Word. We should help them seek God’s will for
their lives. This highest form of love makes no sense apart from God. This
love is a decision that can only be made by those who abide in Christ - by
those who represent His love to others. This is the love that lasts beyond
human attraction or other forms of bonding. Its foundation is not sin - nor
is it even built on good things like fun, companionship, or desire. Rather,
this love is built on God’s love for us. God defines what is good, so God
defines what is love. To love others, therefore, we must know God and
rest in His love for us. God is the epitome, the embodiment of true love.
All His attributes work in harmony with perfect love - even if we don’t
always understand how. The clearest act of love is the clearest reflection
of God’s character. God made us in His image. Though we don’t yet
understand all of what that idea means, scripture explains that we have a
spiritual dimension to our being - something that points to a higher reality.
And even though we have tarnished His image, we are to reflect it in the
highest spiritual dimension of our being. He expects us to reflect His love
and truth to others.
Consider the love at the cross. God took all the punishment for all the sin
every person has ever committed - and bore it Himself. He tore Himself
apart for us - suffering the lashes and the torture, but more painfully, He
divided the Father from the Son for the first time in all eternity. He endured
this separation in order to bridge the divide between Himself and us. Only
someone with the purest love could choose this kind of suffering to reach
out to people who rejected Him. The best form of love that can ever be is
the love of God. It endures with and for us day after day. It was the truth
on the cross that showed the love of God. Jesus says, “I and my Father
are One.” Truth and love must be kept in perfect balance. That is how we
present the message of the bible. Love resolves that great mystery of
death. Because we love we understand the sorrow of death, tribulation,
distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, or sword. The great gift
of life – love and faith make every life a gift from God. And because God
is love, love is not contained by the boundaries of our physical bodies, it
returns to us through the Spirit.
We are commanded to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind. We
must love Jesus more than father, mother, son, or daughter. Two
powerful, deep, life-transforming commands. What is the relationship
between these loves? What is the nature of these loves? It is massively
relevant that we understand this love. The love God calls us to is a long
process. It goes well beyond love at first sight, and focuses ahead instead
on eternity. This love is a choice and a well-developed practice - a grace-
filled, moment-by-moment, day-by-day effort. Biblical love is going long
distance, We worship God and we worship Jesus. Loving Jesus is the
test of whether we love God. Loving God is the test of whether we truly
love Jesus. This is deeper than mere affections. This love is
transformative. It is the obedience to every command of God. Love is
God’s willingness to show up as all of creation…the divine purpose to
come into being - to come into form according to its own desire to express
Itself. This expressed purpose was cause and effect. God came forth in
Christ made in God’s image and likeness. This is the form that love takes.
We are in the last time and love working through us will show up in difficult
ways. Love is the power of God working in us that keeps the storm going
on outside in the world from affecting us on the inside. Love is the spiritual
truth that connects and keeps us in Christ as the bigger storm approaches.
There is a presence in us, a creative intelligence in us, an infinite
consciousness that we call God within and its nature is Love. This
presence is at the very center of our consciousness. In the depth of our
being, there is a spirit within every one of us that is not and cannot be
touched by outer circumstances, no matter what storm we are currently
traveling through. It is the love of God. This love in us bears all things,
believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. God’s grace, His
mercy takes form within us. God’s impartial nature, His image and
likeness allows us to choose, and to choose again. Love willingly allows
itself to fill the mold we create by our choices. By this we choose our way
through life. How might you and I behave because we know that there is
such a Presence in us and in the person we are speaking to and about?
Hard conversations would find appropriate words. Structure and
consistency would find boundary and agreement.
We are created to belong to God and to one another. There is a very
close relationship of how we love God and the way we experience God.
The only image of God which is adequate is ourselves. We are the image
of God, and this image of God is made magnificently visible in Jesus.
Jesus who reflects to us who we truly are. He is the mirror, as it were, of
our true self, the image of the invisible God in us. Scriptural reasoning
teaches us that we must let go of God, the God of our minds, the God of
our concepts in order to love the God of creation, the God whom we come
to know only in the mind of Christ. To love, we must move beyond the
image that may have formed itself in our minds in order to find the reality
of God as manifested in Jesus himself. We must know God by love. Love
means being united in the same act. It means both loving and being loved.
It is not fully love until the loving and the being loved are being balanced.
Love is only fulfilled when the passive and the active dimensions or
elements are balanced; and the receptive part of ourselves, the interior
part of ourselves, is balanced by the giving fully of ourselves as was the
Son of God given fully to us. The giving of love, the receiving of love, and
the ecstasy of love is in the Spirit. We see it expressed perfectly in the
language of Jesus as he describes his relationship as God the Son with
God the Father through his human relationship with his Father. He does
not exclude from that human relationship with his Father all his human
relationships with his family, his friends, his disciples, and indeed all
humanity. Learning to love ourselves, which is the first step into this
balance of love, requires that we learn to be still, that we learn to accept
ourselves, to know ourselves and to allow ourselves to be led beyond
ourselves through stillness of the spirit. Learning to love others means, in
that stillness, we allow ourselves to learn to accept others and see others
for what they really are, not putting them into the molds of our own desires
or our own fears, or projecting our images onto them, but allowing
ourselves to see them and relate to them as they are in themselves in
Christ. We need to be able to see our relationships as something that we
share with others, as the covenant of God’s love brings us, each of us and
all of us, to wholeness, to the wholeness that allows us to share in the
very being of God through Jesus.
It is love that divines us. And we learn to love to love ourselves, to love
others - we learn to love by entering into the mystery of relationship. So,
learning to love ourselves and learning to love others, going hand in hand,
teaches us how to love God. It teaches us who God is, because it is only
by loving that we discover who God is. The unloving know nothing of God.
Prepare for the very difficult ways that are going to show up in this last
time. We must have the deepest love, the deepest faith in God. That is
a wonderful description of wholeness. It’s the wholeness that we are to
seek: the balance, the integration, the reconciliation of all things in our
lives in love – all things. If we learn to love ourselves by being still, and
we learn to love others by withdrawing the way we project our reactions
on to them, we learn to love God simply by being loved, by allowing
ourselves to be loved. Our love of God originates in God’s love for us.
There’s nothing more obvious than that God must have loved us first; God
has created us out of his love for us. Nothing is more obvious, but it’s the
obvious that we always forget. What we learn in deliberately focusing with
spiritual awareness is to remember that God loved us first, and by opening
ourselves to that truth, by accepting that truth, we experience the love of
God flooding our inmost heart through the Holy Spirit he has given us. We
experience ourselves loved; we accept ourselves as loved; we allow
ourselves to be loved. That is what we are doing in a heightened spiritual
sense. And it is as a direct result of that, that we are empowered to love
ourselves, and love others, and love God. We don’t love God before God
loves us and we don’t love God so that He will love us. The true center of
reality then is that the experience of being loved, is the whole meaning of
redemption, and that impels a response in us. We don’t have to try to love
others. It’s impossible to try, to force ourself to love someone, to force
ourself to love ourself. It isn’t an act of the will. We are impelled by the
very nature of the experience of being loved by God to become loving. It
reveals to us our spiritual nature and our spiritual potential.
The journey from head to heart is one of the longest and most difficult that
we have to traverse. How might we understand what it is to love God with
our entire being? With the very essence of our spiritual being? It is not
just about obtaining knowledge, but about growing in wisdom. This is
deeper than the mind and deeper than the reactions. It opens us up to the
fundamental relationship of our being, the deepest identity we have. And
it’s in this relationship with God that all our other relationships, including
even our relationship with ourselves, are rooted. What can be deeper than
our relationship with ourselves? What is deeper is our relationship with
God, the source of our being. This experience of being loved by God
floods the mind and floods the emotions, and even floods the body. It
transfigures every aspect of our being - body and mind, all the levels of
the mind. But it is deeper than all of that. It is precisely because it can
touch every part of our being, including our spirit that it is deeper than
them all. It can be seen by the mind to some degree, and it can be felt in
the emotions, and the emotions are part of our bodies. When we become
whole, the more whole we become, the more integrated we become, the
more we realize that this love of God is not only the background radiation
of the universe; it is what we as a whole person are bathed in. Here we
discover one of the great fruits of spiritual discernment, in that this
experience of God, silently and through stillness, and unselfconsciously,
develops and flowers in us day by day through our journey of self-
reflection in Christ. This experience of God sends us back to the words
and the images of the gospel, not only our own gospel but indeed all
scriptures. It enhances our idea of God as it penetrates our knowledge of
ourselves. We notice phrases, words, images in scripture that we didn’t
even notice before. We notice that Jesus, for example, calls God the One
who truly is; we notice that revelation is reality. We begin to understand
that God is greater than our conscience. That God is greater than our
conscience means that God is deeper than our own thought projection,
deeper than our very essence, deeper than our concept of righteousness.
God is the wisdom which enlightens all light. And this enlightenment is
the combination of our own experience and the teaching we receive
through the wisdom of the understanding of the enlightened minds of the
past. We learn that the only morality is the morality of love; that
forgiveness and compassion are not signs of weakness or compromise or
condescension, but forgiveness and compassion are the very structure of
reality. This is the God who is equally loving to good and bad alike. This
experience of loving God is rooted in our capacity to be loved. And it’s the
great quality of a child that a child wants to be loved. It is that child-like
capacity to be loved that we recover through meditation, our deepest and
truest identity as a child of God. And it is this self-knowledge of ourselves
as a child of God wanting to be loved, and accepting the poverty, the
vulnerability of needing to be loved - it’s that which heals us to ponder all
the day remembering God.
God created us to belong. Sin hindered every relationship. God
determined all things from the beginning and purposed us in Jesus Christ
to good works. Our path is one of the spirit. Our deepest identity is that
we struggle with. It is a real part of us, but it is not the whole person. Our
deepest identity is our identity as a child of God, and it is by discovering
that and knowing that, that we release the pursuit of self. God shows us
Jesus. He shows us love in its capacity to replace impatience and
intolerance with understanding and compassion and love. Love sustains,
love strengthens; love is the willingness of all sacrifice as it manifests
character. This is the higher calling of God. God’s love is such of faith
that we must have the mind of Christ to have the revelation of the reality
to even be conscious of His love let alone His invisibility. Because God's
love is so profound and beyond human comprehension, we can only truly
understand and experience it by aligning our thoughts and perspectives
with that of Jesus Christ, essentially "having the mind of Christ," which
allows us to access a deeper understanding of God's love through faith.
An unconditional, sacrificial love…how can we grasp it. In Jesus,
characterized by humility, compassion, and an intenseness on serving
others. We must have a spiritual experience through faith to begin to
comprehend the intentions of such love. And to know the love of Christ,
which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of
God is to have confidence in the day of judgment.
God has never been seen. In other words, because God is love, He can
never be an object outside of ourselves. It is the mind that is always
creating an eternal reality. We do this continually, which is why in our
prayer we need to go deeper than the mind, to that level of our being - the
heart, the spirit where there is no thing outside of us; where we understand
that we are in relationship, in communion, in the dance of being, with
everything that is in God. And this is what each of us is called to, each of
us is capable of. That’s why in our meditation, we surrender God in us.
We surrender all ideas or images of God as being an object that can be
seen, or a thing that can be thought, some thing outside of ourselves. As
a believer, the thoughts and ideas that shape our beliefs and attitudes
must be filtered through truth. God has never been seen, but dwells in us
if we love one another. That is the whole structure of the believer’s life.
God cannot be seen but dwells in us, if we love one another. Love is then
brought to perfection. Love is a school. We are learning to love by loving.
Meditation is the principal lesson by which we are learning. We learn from
meditation that love is the only thing on which we will be evaluated as the
aim of life. We must offer love in abundance without guile or deceit. Ours
must be tendrils of love clinging to the garment of God visibly woven,
maintained, and restored through grace.
We are to strive for the love that can only be reached when human love is
intense and always present as of Jesus. Beyond the confines of worldly
relationships, in all places, at all times, under all circumstances. For such
a one, all experiences and perceptions are suffused with love, all
thoughts, words and deeds emanate from this love, all relationships and
interactions are based on love. This aspect of love is imperishable, it is
eternal. This degree of love is immanent in everyone - as human beings,
we all have the potential to attain this manner of love. We must
understand the difference between relationship and encounter. Encounter
is to meet as an adversary or enemy. It is that unexpected experience
whereby we are faced with hostility. It’s a confrontation measured by
violence and controversial circumstances. A relationship is a connection
regarding and behaving toward another where thoughtful and clear
support and growth are fostered. It is the sincere belonging and sharing
of experiences always in the openness of truth. Love is the foundation of
God-purposed relationships, and that love should be characterized by
selflessness, kindness, and forgiveness. There is no gap, no compromise
in a truthful love relationship – only one side – the Lord’s side. Focused
and driven mutually and prayerfully in its Christ centeredness. As we
come to the fullness of such love, we will experience a peace that passes
all understanding. This is the resurrection power of faithful, sacrificial,
joyful, biblical love. We will be the people of God who are arranged in
advance to be spoken of in generations of eternities by sincere men and
women. We will be living answers to the question of "what is love".
📖 Applying the Study
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