Love Came Down at Christmas
I recently completed a self-study of the Gospel of John. I had chosen to study that particular Gospel because I felt - I KNEW - that it was about Jesus and His oneness with God. It was about the Love of God for us, His children. But even though I'd read John's Gospel before, I stopped and re-read the passage from John 13 several times. A new commandment, that we love one another as He loved us.
When I was younger I thought love was just a feeling: something akin to the multiple crushes that I had on the girls at church and school. I thought it was romantic, and affectionate. A warmth over you like a comfy blanket on a chilly evening.
Years ago, though, I realized that love was not a noun, but a verb. Love is an action. Love isn't how we feel for someone, but what we do for that person to show them that they and their needs are more important than ours. And while it was easy for me to identify that love was a verb - an action - it has taken time for me to even slightly understand it. And that is why John 13:34-35 has such an impact on me.
There are other verses in John's Gospel that speak of God's love, such as the famous John 3:16. That is the example of God's love for us, in that He gave us the means to be one with Him through His Son. But the love that we are to live here on earth, the Love given to us by the Holy Spirit, is the love that Jesus speaks of in chapter 13: we are to love one another. And that is the love that I acknowledge today as my family and I light the Fourth Candle.
And on this night, Christmas Eve, we light the Fifth Candle, the Christ Candle, and I pray that we truly practice the Love of God amongst ourselves, as Jesus commanded us to do.
Merry Christmas!
Soli Deo Gloria
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