Why Love is So Important

1. Jesus taught that "the great and first commandment" is to love God completely, totally, and unreservedly-- with all one's heart, with all one's soul, and with all one's mind (Matthew 22:37-38; Mark 12:28-34). The sum of all God's commandments and all religious service is love for God.
   
   
2. Jesus declared the second commandment is like the first: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22:39). Jesus makes love for God and neighbor inseparable companions.
   
   
3. True discipleship requires denying self and loving him above all other (Matthew 10:37-38).
   
   
4. Jesus left his followers a new commandment: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you.. By this all people will know that you are my disciples" (John 13:34). To neglect the new commandment would render the Christian life as "nothing" -- as not Christian.
   
   
5. John, the beloved disciple of Christ, declared that "God is love" (1 John 4:8, 16)
   
   
6. Paul called love the "more excellent way" of living. Love is the chief virtue that should govern all we do and say in the Christian life (1 Corinthians 12:31).
   
   

From Love or Die: Christ's Wake-Up Call to the Church by Alexander Strauch