IN THE WORDS OF JESUS–Part 408

Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

ON LOVE; PART I

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GoodWill IS Love in Action

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After CLXXXVIII essays with the title ON GOD, we are changing our sub-sub-heading to ON LOVE which as we KNOW is the same thing but which at the same time is Truer to our working premise of Love as man’s relationship to both man and God. This new heading will also will work well with our sub-heading of Love is the Fulfilling of the Law and with our rather new permanent banner of GoodWill IS Love in Action. We have ofttimes said that it is our ability to Love that is the WAY, par excellence, of progressing in one’s spiritual Life and this requires a diligent attitude of fending off all the negative thoughts that swirl through our minds regarding other people, groups, cultures and ideas. To clarify our use of headings we should say that the topmost heading, IN THE WORDS OF JESUS, is the objective if not the substance of our essays insofar as it is the words of the Master that should rule our understanding of the entirety of the NEW TESTAMENT and the words of the apostles in commentary within the gospels and the Book of Acts and in their epistles should serve to amplify the Master’s words and perhaps put them in a different Light for our ease of understanding them. The apostles words should never change nor detract from the words of the Master and we should ever view His words as He tells us that they are saying: “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63).

We used this saying by the Master recently in a different context which was our reflection on the Greek word zoopoieo that is translated as quickeneth and our comment there will serve as well in this current perspective view of His words as the foundation for one’s Faith and the working model for one’s actions in Life. Our comments on this saying were: Jesus is not speaking here about the Life of the mortal body, the flesh, He is speaking about Himself as the Bread of Life and is, in His parabolic way, telling those gathered, many of which were disciples, that it is the Spirit of His words that are the nourishment for the Life of the Soul in form. It is His words, either from our reading or from the Christ Within, that quickeneth because in His words is Life.The Master’s words are not the pronunciation of the syllables, they are the instructions for right living, they are Love and they are righteousness. It is in this context that the Apostle James tells us to “be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22).

Our next heading, Love is the Fulfilling of the Law, is from the writings of the Apostle Paul and from a section that confirms the words of the Master regarding Love. This is a section that we repeat with some frequency either as a part of an essay or as a Quote of the Day; Paul says: “Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Romans 13:8-10). Relating this to our ideas from the last post we should see that in the enunciation here of  some of the Ten Commandments we effectively have a part of the rudiments of the world that Paul was referring to and in the reality that “love is the fulfilling of the law” we have the reality of one who IS “dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world” (Colossians 2:20). In addition to this we see the apostle telling us clearly and amplifying the words of the Master that Love IS the most important of ALL that a man can do.

Finally is our new heading ON LOVE which is not too much unlike ON GOD for as we KNOW from our Quote of the day for the last several days that, “God is love” (1 John 4:16). These words, are an amplification of the Master’s words as well and we make this point again to show the interaction of it all and the veracity of our statement above. The Master speaks about the Love of God in many ways; some directly as we see in the sayings below and some indirectly as we show below as well. The direct:

• “But woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass over judgment and the love of God: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone” (Luke 11:42) Here the Master is referring directly to the Love of God as the counter to the Pharisees behavior; He is telling them that they, as purported representatives of God to man, should not have been concerned about themselves but rather should have been concerned with their expression of the Love of God to man.
• “But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you” (John 5:42). Here again the master is using these words directly and again in the context of the behavior of the Jews in His day and, seeing this is at the temple, presumably religious Jews. Again there is direct reference to the Love of God and a reference as well to the understanding that merely because one proclaims to be a holy or religious person, does not make him so. Here this point is driven by the lack of the Love of God as the expression of the man in form.

While there are not many direct references to the Love of God in the gospels one can get the impression that this was a rather standard understanding by the Jews and this based upon the Master’s handy reference to it. This aside, there are also several ways that this Love is expressed indirectly. Some of these are:

• First and foremost are ALL the references to the Fatherhood of God insomuch as the relationship between and father and his children is understood to be one of Love. This is to be seen as especially True of the Love between Our Father God and we, His children, as Souls expressing Life through form. This is seen in this saying that reflects God’s Love for ALL regardless of their actions here on Earth: “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). We should understand here that the Master’s notation of “ye may be the children of your Father” is a matter of realization as in this very phrase he is yet called “your Father” and we should see also the nature of Love in the giving to the deserved and the undeserved.
• Similarly the Master tells us of the Loving care that we as men get from our Father; He tells us that: “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows” (Matthew 10:29-31). It is unfortunate that many take these verses so literally as to see it as the ALL KNOWING SUPREME GOD of the ENTIRE CREATION is to work in such a way that HE keeps track of the sparrows and of the number of hairs on each man. This is  rather another parabolic saying that implies for us the care that we get from our LOVING Father God. While we cannot understand fully the idea of the sparrows as spoken here we can KNOW that ALL things that happen in His Awesome Creation are in the history of that Creation and are thereby forever noted by the Creation itself. In a broad understanding of Life we can see also this KNOWING of God and of the God Within regarding hairs but this is not intended as a literal representation any more than the difference in the number of sparrows that the Master tells us are sold; Luke’s Gospel tells us that “Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings” (Luke 12:6).
  • In doctrine these words have come to represent a part of the belief that some maintain of predestination or the idea of the hand of God in ALL things but these views are not supported in scripture and are warned against by the apostles who tell us that “God is no respecter of persons” (Acts 10:34). The Master here is showing us of the care and the Love of the Father and the value of the Soul that is man who is not born nor does he die; this is not a depiction of the predestination of things as thought by some asd as is related in this story given to us by Vincent: A Rabbinic legend relates how a certain Rabbi had been for thirteen years hiding from his persecutors in a cave, where he was miraculously fed; when he observed that when the bird-catcher laid his snare, the bird escaped or was caught, according as a voice from heaven proclaimed “Mercy” or “Destruction.” Arguing that if even a sparrow cannot be caught without heaven‘s bidding, how much more safe was the life of a son of man, he came forth⁴.

It is easy to forget that Master’s words are most always in parable and it is interesting to note how some of the parabolic is taken as literal and as fact and how some of the most straightforward is overlooked completely.

Our last heading, our banner if you will, is the motivation of most ALL that we write as we try to show the utter importance of the idea of Love that the Master teaches and that the apostles repeat and amplify. Our theme is on GoodWill which we see as the active part of that Love that the Master teaches us and not that love that attracts a man to others in the world; wives, lovers, children, pets and even things. Remembering our perspective on this Love as we adapted it from the 1828 Websters’s definition of Charity we should be able to see our banner’s perspective saying: GoodWill IS Love in Action. Our adapted understanding of Love is In a general sense love is benevolence, good will; that disposition of heart which inclines men to think favorably of their fellow men, and to do them good. In a theological sense, it includes supreme love to God, and universal good will to men. This we recognize as the intent of the Master’s varied sayings of Love and especially His pronouncement that  “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Mark 12:31) which is said as a part of the Greatest of Commandments. Not to leave out that other saying of the Master that helps us to understand this perspective of Love and which gives us guidance on what is that Love of self and how to apply this to others, we repeat here that He tells us “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12). In this we see that we must show to ALL the same respect and grace that we expect to receive from others and what it is that we may come to expect is the measure of the Love that a man has for himself. We want fairness, we give fairness; we want mercy, we give mercy; we want justice, we give justice; we want respect we give respect and these things we do, as Emett Fox tells us, whether the other fellow does so or not.**

We end today with two points from the Master’s words. First is this from John’s Gospel; Jesus is telling us plainly that if we claim to love Him that we must KNOW His commandments which is rather easy to accomplish but he adds here also that a man must also keep them. Now while we do say that the first part of this is easy to accomplish we do not mean this in a slight way as we KNOW that these commandments are not what we read and memorize, they are what we have in our hearts as given to us from the Soul, the Christ Within. The Master says:

“He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him” (John 14:21).

Our last point is from Paul who tells us clearly that we, as aspirants and disciples functioning here on Earth as men in form, are the channel of Love to ALL. This is the Love that flows through into our consciousness, our hearts to use the Master’s word, and which comes from the Holy Spirit which we KNOW IS the activity of the Christ Within in form. The apostle is addressing this to those who are “justified by faith” and who “have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand” and who “rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Romans 5: 1:2); he is addressing his words to aspirants and disciples and telling them of the way of the disciple who can say with him that:

“And hope maketh not ashamed ; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us” (Romans 5:5).

We will continue with our thoughts in the next post.

Note on the Quote of the Day