Devotionals

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In a race between love and knowledge, talent, or any other kind of ability, love would win every time. Love would cross the finish line before the others got off the blocks.

Rhetorical eloquence without love is like the promise of a beautiful apple--which is worm eaten on the inside. If one is incapable of speaking love, none of his speech matters. Love is the most eloquent of all languages, though always spoken in the common tongue, because love is the language that heals, that binds up the broken-hearted, that makes peace and returns good for evil, that speaks words of refreshment in time of need, that bears the burdens of another, that proclaims liberty to the captive and returns praise to the Lord.

Love points to wells of hope in the bleakest deserts of despair, and thus love increases faith. Love is one-hundred percent visible, understandable, communicable--but not always in words.

Love can move more weighty barriers than all the powers of mere understanding or knowledge. Even the results of supernatural revelation and prophecy are not to be compared with those of love. If one may move mountains, yet cannot move in the realm of love, he is nothing, and hasn't understood the first matter; he is weaker than a child in that which counts.

If you could give up your own body in sacrifice for a noble cause, but could not give it for the lowest among men, you would have nothing to offer mankind. If you gave away everything material only to be seen, and not for love, you would gain in return that which is nothing. Sacrifice which is not filled with love is empty, and love takes no notice of sacrifice.

As giving is the heart's reward, so love overflows with giving. Love does the greatest things as if they were the least, and never thinks that it has given all it can. Love's eyes look outward, not upon self, for love knows that in giving the heart is not emptied, but made full. Love will give itself for the beloved and for no other reason.

Love is the starting and finishing line for speaking, knowing, doing and giving. When you have given love (that which is motivated soley by the good of another), then you may rest; you have done what was needed.

Love brands the one who embraces it with indelible marks: Patience, kindness, gentleness, meekness, peace, purity, generosity, selflessness, faith, joy, hope. The stronger one's grip on love--and the longer love is held--the deeper will be the imprint.

Love is full of encouragements, according honor to others and seeking their advancement--not detracting from, but rather adding to, their reputations. Love is always ready to believe the best of everyone, quickly embracing the best interpretation of all events, and slow to be angry or touchy about perceived slights to self. Indeed, love is hardly mindful of offenses to self, for it lives and breathes to promote the welfare of others.

The eyes of love look beneath the surface of words and actions, entering a realm where no other vision or insight may go--for it seeks the motives, heart to heart speaking. Love is saddened at a true report of another's failure, but happy when truth prevails and others succeed. It is able to rejoice with those who rejoice, and to weep with those who weep.

Love is not a destination, but a pathway. And, love's way is not easy, for it leads always upward and ever to higher realms. But, love travels with anyone who takes up this road. Those upon it must give sweat, tears, and sometimes blood, to travel farther on. For, love's way is to bear up under whatever comes, and love endures whatever is neccessary in order to continue loving. But, on this path the light grows greater the farther one goes, until the final day dawns eternal. Along the way, faith and hope are incessant companions of love, but they always look to love to know the way.

God is the reason for love, because "God is love." Human love is partial, but God's love is perfect. Words--all words--eventually fail, but love goes on; material giving ceases, but love's gift continues; knowledge expires, but love surpasses all and never needs updating. Love's work is never finished. Prophecy, knowledge and revelation have a set time, but it is always--and ever will be--time for love. All these other things are temporal; love is eternal. Love is God. For this love we seek, and for perfect love we wait, and when the God of Love comes we shall see as we are seen, know as we are known, and love as we are loved.

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