God Is Love

In the beginning God created us in his image with the capacity to relate to other persons like he does. Furthermore, he demonstrated how persons relate to each other by how he does. He did not create us to worship him as if he needed something (Acts 17:25), but as those on whom he could bestow himself. In so doing, he established in the natural image the capacity for the ethical image expressed as outward-directed behavior toward others. That pattern scripture calls “love,” even saying, “God ‘is’ love” (1 John 4:8).

Love is self-giving for the joy and fulfillment of others. The degree of that love God expressed in creation is eclipsed by the degree of love he expressed in re-creation: “God showed his love toward us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). We acknowledge that love in this rite of recognition and remembrance. We say that we will do as much for him and others in return. That way we will “be” love as well.