Add Love to Your Faith

The final characteristic the apostle Peter urges us to add to our faith is love (2 Peter 1:5-7). Love is the ultimate quality of God, and we must strive to reflect it in our own lives.

John, who is often called the apostle of love, wrote:

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.” (1 John 4:7)

Learning to love as God loves is a lifelong journey. However, this love serves as the engine that motivates us to build and strengthen all other Christian qualities.

How Love Strengthens Christian Qualities

A deep love for God transforms how we live out our faith. Here is how love strengthens the other qualities Peter mentions:

• Faith: Love helps us endure difficult trials because we trust the God we love.
• Moral Excellence: Our desire to be like God motivates us to live clean, honorable lives.
• Knowledge: When we love someone, we want to know everything about them. Love drives us to study God’s Word.
• Self-Control: We control our desires because we do not want to disappoint our Heavenly Father.
• Perseverance: Love gives us the strength to keep going through exhaustion and persecution, knowing Jesus endured the cross for us.

Ultimately, love is the foundation of godliness. As our love grows, our focus shifts away from ourselves and centers entirely on God.

Finally, love strengthens our brotherly kindness. As the apostle John wrote:

“…he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 John 4:20)

Unconditional Love

True love does not depend on how others treat us. God showed His love for us while we were still rebelling against Him (Romans 5:8). Jesus died on the cross even as the people around Him mocked and spat on Him.

Sometimes, you will show deep love to others and receive nothing but indifference or hatred in return. When this happens, you experience a tiny fraction of the unconditional love God has for you. If we only love others to get something in return, we miss the entire point of love.

Jesus commanded us to love our enemies. He said:

“But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” (Matthew 5:44-45)

Loving those who mistreat us is one of the hardest commands to follow. Yet, Jesus forgave the very men who nailed Him to the cross. Even while dying, He saved the thief who had previously mocked Him.

If our Savior demonstrated this kind of love, we are called to do the same. If we only love those who are nice to us, we are doing nothing extraordinary (Matthew 5:47).

Sacrificial Love

True love requires sacrifice. God’s love was so immense that He gave His only Son to die for us (John 3:16).

Think about how difficult it would be to give up your own child. In the Old Testament, Abraham was willing to offer his son Isaac because he loved and trusted God completely. Abraham knew God’s character and believed that God could even raise Isaac from the dead (Hebrews 11:17-19).

To love like this, we must make sacrifices:

• Our Time: To serve God and grow spiritually.
• Our Resources: To support God’s work and help others.
• Our Relationships: If they pull us away from our faith.

Ultimately, we must sacrifice our own self-interest. By losing ourselves in service to God, we find our true purpose.

Loving the Souls of Others

Finally, we must share God’s love for people’s souls. This means we should desire that everyone is saved and act in ways that reflect that desire.

We should share the Gospel with those who do not know it, and gently reach out to erring (straying or wandering from the truth) Christians (James 5:19-20; Jude 22). Even when we must correct or debate someone using the Bible, we must always speak the truth in love (2 Timothy 2:22-26; Ephesians 4:15).

In the end, love is the only quality that outlasts this world, because “love never fails.”