Daily Devotion: A Perfect Kind of Love

Scripture:
1 John 4:18 There is no fear where love exists. Rather, perfect love banishes fear, for fear involves punishment, and the person who lives in fear has not been perfected in love.

Observation:
God is love.

The verse appears twice in chapter 4 of 1 John. God himself is love, therefore love comes from Him. God manifested this love when He sent his son Jesus to die on the cross so that we can gain eternal life. There is no other kind of perfect love in this world than that kind of love. 

We are capable of loving because love comes from God. Verse 11 states that God was willing to sacrifice his only Son out of love. A sacrifice! How many of us would be willing to die for others out of love? No amount of sacrifice can equal this perfect love that comes only from God. But if we truly love God, his Spirit will be with us and love will be perfected in us. 

Application:
As I read this verse, I was reminded again by my brother-in-law's wife's thoughts about God. She said that she cannot understand how a God who is full of love can allow a terrible thing such as death to happen to the daughter of her Christian friend. She mentioned that she fears God, because she has the thinking that sickness and death came from God. 

If her Christian friend's daughter died with Christ in her heart, then the love of God has been perfected in her. All of us have our fears. We have fear of losing our jobs if we have no assurance that God will replace it with a better one. We fear visiting our family in the Philippines whenever we hear or read news about killings everywhere. We develop fear if we know in our hearts that we are not ready for that time when our spirit separates from our body through death. Everything on earth is imperfect. But verse 18 tells us otherwise: "There is no fear where love exists. Perfect love banishes fear." The perfect love of God drives away that fear! 

Prayer:
Dear God, I desire for your perfect love. May your love be greater than the fear that dwells in our hearts, for you alone are perfect. AMEN.