Love

The fish is in its element when dwelling in the sea. Man’s proper element is love. Man out of love is out of his native element. Love is the greatest thing in life. The worth of a deed is estimated, not by the deed itself, but by the amount of love there is in it. Love associates the object loved with every thing in life. Labor is the essential property of love. “And labor of love.”* (1 Thessalonians 1:3) Love is the must of life. “I must work the works of him that sent me.”* (John 9:4) The labor of love is expressed in giving or in putting forth effort to obtain something to give. Love lives to give. It must give that it might live. Love is not in the word, but in the deed. “Let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.”* (1 John 3:18) The tongue may talk of love, but the deed talks loudest. “God so loved the world that he gave.”* (John 3:16) You love an object when you love it so that you give yourself for it. Less than this is not love. Love gives itself. We must cut the roses from the rose bush on our lawn or it will cease giving us roses. It must give its roses that it may produce more roses. Love must give that it may keep on loving.