What Is The Bible – Part 5, God’s Love Letter

Series: The Big Questions

Series summary

Many religions hold the Bible in high esteem. Certainly the religions do that sprang from Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The thousands of variations of these beliefs reference the Bible.

God loves all creation. Psalm 145:9: “The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made.”

Image: What’s That All About Then? by Smabs Sputzer on Flickr

God’s love for people

The Bible is a book about people’s perceptions of God’s influence and work in their lives. God is love. In applying it to our lives, love is the filter through which we interpret all of it.

What Is the Bible? Part 1

What God asks of us

All through time God has had a relationship with people and had agreements with them. What God asks of us is moral behavior. Moral: “principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character.” God didn’t abandon the creation that God loves.

What Is the Bible? Part 2

Love is the lens through which we interpret everything

The Christian Bible, which includes the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament of Christ, speaks a lot. You can get hung up on all of the different ideas presented in it. But if you use the incredibly important filter of “love” to understand what it means, including the covenants, you understand that it is a book about love.

God loves all people. Being chosen doesn’t mean God loves only certain people. Rather it’s interpreted by many modern Jews and others as a position of service and example.

What Is the Bible – Part 3, The Covenant of Example, of Love

Law is love

The early parts of the Bible brought law into mankind and then the nation of Israel. Law isn’t about obeying rules and regulations, it’s a reflection of love and putting into words some minimum requirements of love.

Today there are over 2000 Christian denominations whose interpretations and traditions vary. We need to follow the example of Jesus and view them through the lens of love without criticism.

Jesus didn’t reject any “religion.” The Jewish Traditions of the Fathers and the various sects of Judaism, he didn’t say they were wrong. He simply implied to view them through the lens of love. We need to do the same today about other denominations and religions.

Love is the teaching of most religions. It is the teaching that unites us all. Love is the thing that makes us acceptable to God.

How could we possibly act out of love for others yet break any relevant law?

What Is the Bible – Part 4, The Covenant of Love by Example

What it’s all about

Jesus didn’t come into the world swinging a big stick to destroy religions. He didn’t declare anyone unworthy or condemned, although he took a dim view of hypocritical leaders. He didn’t declare the law invalid, just that it was proclaimed until John the Baptist, and showed us to view it through love, not an inflexible standard. He gave us a new lens through which to view all religion: Love. He gave us a new emphasis: love.

Jesus condemned no one during his direct ministry. He reflected the love of God in loving everyone. He associated with the least of us and showed us by example the better way to live, the way of God. What is that way? Behavior that doesn’t harm others and helps them, mercy, forgiveness, love.

What does it mean to be a Christian? Is it a place of privilege? Or a place of service?

It’s a high standard of behavior that is an example to others, and a high standard of acceptance of others and treating them with love just as Jesus did.

God first, people second, by example

Whether looking at the entire Bible or looking at the development of Judaism, God gave to us first. Then came covenants with people in which God asked us to be his example in mercy, forgiveness, lawful behavior, and love.

The early covenants were God’s promise to mankind. The later covenants in Judaism were contractual agreements of if… then…. The new covenant through Jesus is about God’s promise of goodwill and salvation through grace and love … if people will follow the Spirit of God that is within them and try to emulate the example of Jesus. Christians are notably those who try to be this example to others.