One People of God - the love effect

WORD 2day: Thursday, Fifth week in the Eastertide

May 2, 2024 - Acts 15: 7-21; John 15: 9-11

"God arranged to enlist a people for God's name out of the pagans"... and the apostles had identified the right priority when they decided "not to make things more difficult for people who turn to God." That is the wisdom that the Spirit gave them to choose that one criteria - the wellbeing, the utltimate wellbeing of the other - that which makes us One people of God.

Wishing the well being of the other, wishing the good of the other, that is, to love is the way traced for us to truly become people called and chosen by God.  To choose love and to remain in that love the way to our joy, complete and God given joy. But where do we learn this from? From the Lord himself. 

This is what makes us people of God and makes us one people of God. Only those who love can be called the people of God, for those who love are born of God says the Word. Unless we love we do not have yet what it takes to be identified as people of God. It cannot be feigned, it is a way of life - a way of life that is against selfishness, ego, competitions that prioritise oneself. Only love can save us from all these and unite us as one. 

It is obviously love that makes us one people of God. Anything else that brings us together, it could be circumstances, challenges, fear of opposition, calculations of gain and loss, scheming in order to arrive at a hidden agenda...these may bring us together but they will never make us "one" and much less "one people of God". Love alone can, because love is the sap that flows into us from the vine, making us live branches united into one.