GOD’S LOVE FREES US

October 3, 2025

We love, because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19

1. THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT. In Mark 12, a scribe – like a lawyer or scholar for the Jewish faith – asked Jesus, “What commandment is the foremost of all?” At that time, there were hundreds of commandments, including the Ten Commandments given to Moses. Jesus narrowed it down: “‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:28-31). Love is vertical (to and from God) and horizontal (toward our neighbor). 

2. A COMMITMENT TO THE LOVE WALK. The apostle Paul wrote: “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5). As Paul wrote these words, he was living in the Roman Empire – an era when Christians were thrown to lions as the masses watched and celebrated carnage – but the message of Jesus kept growing. Today, the Roman Empire is gone, but the Kingdom of God has no end because it is rooted in love. Its leader is Jesus, the embodiment of love.

3. FORGIVEN MUCH. LOVE MUCH. We were lost and couldn’t save ourselves. The Bible says that all of our righteousness is like filthy rags in God’s sight (Isaiah 64:6), and we can’t be redeemed by religious performance. To love God with great appreciation stems from our awareness of the debt we owed. When we understand God has forgiven us much, we can love much (Luke 7:47). Because God is merciful to us, we can renew our commitment to love Him with all our heart, with all our mind, and with all our strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

DEFINITION: for·give, verb 

To pardon; to remit, as an offense or debt; to overlook an offense and treat the offender as not guilty.

^{Copyright © 2025 St. Louis Family Church, All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reprinted or distributed in any form without prior written permission of St. Louis Family Church. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture references are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved. “Forgive, V.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, 2025, https://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/forgive}