[Jesus said to his
disciples:
“Do not think that I
have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to
abolish but to fulfill.“] (Mt. 5:17)
“The fulfillment of
the law is Love” (Rm. 13:10). Though simpler to recite than the hundreds of
rabbinic laws, Jesus proposes a more difficult and excellent way (cf. 1Cor.
12:31).
According to St.
Thomas Aquinas, Love is “willing the good of the other for the other’s sake”.
That’s tough! True love has no hint of selfishness in it. Yikes!
Yet Jesus isn’t asking
anything of us He Himself didn’t do on the cross, AND anything He isn’t
doing in us now.
Take some time today
and ask God about His love for you, and your love for Him and others.
Do I strive to love
God and others as Jesus does?
(1 Corinthians
13:1-13)
If I speak in human
and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a
clashing cymbal.
And if I have the gift
of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith
so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give away
everything I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast but do not
have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love
is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated,
it is not rude, it
does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood
over injury,
it does not rejoice
over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.
It bears all things,
believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. If
there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will
cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.
For we know partially
and we prophesy partially, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass
away.
When I was a child, I
used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a
man, I put aside childish things.
At present we see
indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know
partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.
So faith, hope,
love remain, these three;h but the greatest of these is love.
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