Posted: Oct. 3, 2020 12:01 am
Praise him, praise him/All ye little children./God is love, God is love./Praise him, praise him/All ye little children./God is love, God is love."
Those are some of the lyrics of a little song we sang when I was a child in Sunday School.
"Moses responded, ‘Then show me your glorious presence.' And the Lord said, "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you'" (Exodus 33:18,19).
When Moses asks God to allow him to see God's presence, God reveals his goodness. God's essence is love, yes, but perhaps even more, God is goodness.
People say, "God is love," but while goodness and love can be related, they can be different from each other. This is also true in one's love for people.
Many people who have been filled with feelings of love for country, humanity, the planet or their religion, have not been good people. It is possible to have feelings of love for another person, but to treat the person badly. Many men and women who feel love for their spouses or significant others treat them abusively. Often abusive parents love the children they abuse, or at least they believe they love them.
Love is amoral. Love is moral depending on what or whom one loves and how one expresses it. Many people have loved bad individuals. Think of the millions who have loved Hitler, Stalin and other mass-murdering dictators. Consider the many women who fall in love with and live with mean men.
At the same time, while many individuals who feel love do bad things, good people do good, whether they happen to have loving feelings.
That God chose to describe himself as good is one of the most important statements in the Bible. God does not say, "I will make my love pass before you." In fact, except for in the King James Version, I don't think the words, "God is love" can be found in the Bible.
While love can mean a loving action, it is usually understood to mean a feeling. On the other hand, goodness always implies an action. The Bible is most concerned about how people act over how we feel. "Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead" (James 2:17).
Love without action is dead. Whether we love others is less important than how we treat them.
Jay Craig of Shelbina, Mo., has worked with Shiloh Christian Children's Ranch for nearly 40 years. He's a husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Craig attended Central Christian College of the Bible in Moberly, Mo. He can be contacted by email to jayd.craig@gmail.com.
"Love" - Google News
October 03, 2020 at 12:01PM
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Is God more good than love, more love than good, or is He equally both? - Herald-Whig
"Love" - Google News
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