Growing in Love

 

“Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing.”

2 Thessalonians 1:1-3 ESV

 

It’s clear from Scripture that the desire of God is that we should love one another. We’re called to love our neighbor as ourselves. We’re called to love the stranger, or the alien, who lives among us as we love ourselves. We’re called to love one another as Christ has loved us. And we’re called to love even our enemies.

 

We know this and, although we try our best to carry it out, we continually fall short. And, as we see this reality, our primary response is simply to try harder. Our primary response is self-motivation or even group-motivation.

 

The problem with this is that, because of our sinful nature, love does not come natural to us. Even among those for whom it seems love should be natural, it’s very difficult. And when it comes to those who hate us, it’s impossible.

 

How, then, do we grow in this area of our life? How do we grow in love for one another? The answer to this is implied in the above passage.

 

Paul gives thanks to God for the Thessalonians because their faith was growing abundantly. In addition to this, he says, their love for one another was growing. And it seems clear that there’s a correlation between the two.

 

As they grew in faith, they grew in love. And the same is true for each of us. As we grow in faith, our love for one another naturally grows along with it.

 

This follows naturally because, as we trust in Christ, our heart is conformed to his own. As we trust in Christ, good works naturally follow. And these works are empowered by the Spirit of God.

 

We see this, for example, as we look at Galatians 5. Love, we see, is a fruit of the Spirit. In other words, it’s empowered by the Spirit of God.

 

Growing in love, then, is not something that we can produce by our own strength or effort. It’s, rather, something that’s produced by God through faith in Jesus. In short, as we grow in faith, so too will we grow in love.

 

If we, then, are to grow in love, we must grow in faith. And, once again, this is not something that we accomplish. It’s not something that’s attained by our own efforts. We grow in faith as God works in us by his Word and Spirit.