“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”
1 John 4:7-12
Every year during the Advent season, believers around the world reflect on the themes of hope, peace, joy, and love as they wait for the promised Savior with preparation and expectation. Each Advent week’s theme communicates what the coming of Christ provides for everyone who believes. Christ’s incarnation brought hope, peace, and joy to life while being one of the biggest acts of love there ever was and will be. Not only was this an expression of love, but it was Love Himself making a way where there was no way.
From the Old to the New Testament, God makes the case of the statement in 1 John 4:8, “God is love.” From His everlasting covenant with Abraham to His pursuit of the Gentiles through Paul and others, God has shown Himself to be loved and the essence of love itself. In the famous ‘love passage’ found in 1 Corinthians 13, many characteristics of love are mentioned, such as patience, kindness, humility, and truth—all embodied by God. God abounds in love and has demonstrated His love to us in many ways. God’s love was demonstrated through the coming of Christ, the death of Christ while we were still sinners, and His resurrection. Consequently, it affirms that God is love, His name is Love, His nature is Love, and His actions are fully laced with and come from love.
The love demonstrated in Christ’s incarnation is paramount to fully grasping what the Advent season is all about. Knowing the truth that God is love allows us to take part in the hope, peace, and joy that the Advent season calls us to focus on. The pinnacle of this season, Christ’s coming, is not just an event that we celebrate, but it is connected to the metanarrative of scripture—creation, fall, redemption, and restoration. Christ’s coming is how redemption is possible; Christ fulfills God’s promises in the Old Testament. For as it is written, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). God loved the world and allowed love to come in the form of Christ to save the world He created.
As I reflect on the gift of love that Christ is, I am led to praise and conviction. My prayer for you is that you will also come to this position. I hope you can praise God for the love that He is and has shown to us through the person of Christ Jesus. Through Him, we have abundant life and the opportunity of eternal life with the Creator of all. Praise God for this miraculous gift!
Additionally, I am exceedingly filled with conviction to love well. I want to love others and embody all that comes with it, like kindness, humility, patience, truth, etc., as 1 Corinthians 13 defines love to be. As a Student Discipleship Resident, I work alongside the Fellows program in many ways. I am responsible for loving and caring for them daily. This allows me to practice this kind of love every day. I want to love the Fellows like God does in every way, whether through refereeing intramurals, discipleship, or even discipline. I also hope you will choose to love like Christ in this season.
Reflection Questions
- Have you taken time to praise God for His demonstration of love through the incarnation of Jesus Christ recently?
- Are there areas in your life where you could continue to learn to embody love more like Christ?
JJ Harrison
Impact 360 Institute
Student Discipleship Resident