The Mystery of Love

I was reading a book by T. Austin-Sparks today titled "His Great Love." The opening pages captivated me. Here's a little excerpt from the book that really got me going:

"We shall come to the understanding of God only along the path of the love of God. Everything is revolving upon this pivot of the universe - the heart of God."

In this simple little sentence, Sparks is telling us that everything - not some things or a few things, but everything - in the universe revolves around God's heart. "The heart of the universe," says Sparks, "is this matter of God's love."

How powerful! This is exactly what the Holy Spirit has been telling me over and over again!

Sparks goes on to say that with this key - that is, with the knowledge that God's love is the heart of the universe - we can unlock the whole of the Scriptures. "The Bible," says Sparks, "is one continuous and growing revelation of this central and basic fact, that love is the motive of all things."

The key to unlocking the Bible is the basic fact that love is the motive of all things.

WOW!!!

Do you see the power in this? Can you hear the Apostle Paul - a former religious Pharisee and keeper of the law - telling the Romans: "Love is the fulfillment of the law." (Romans 13:10)?

Love is the motive of all things. Love is the key that unlocks the whole of the Scriptures. The whole Bible revolves around love - God's love, the love of His Son and the love we share.

One word: Love. So simple, and yet oh so powerful and mysterious.

Sparks asks a simple question: "What was the motive of creation, and of man as the very center of the creation?"

The answer? "It was love."

"All the rest of the Bible," says Sparks, "is an unfolding of God's love for us." Sparks writes:

"We were made for the heart of God. It is a mystery. The mystery deepens and grows as we go on; but there is always a mystery about love, even amongst humans. Love is a strange thing. Very often you cannot for the life of you explain why some people love certain other people - why it was that So-and-so fell in love with So-and-so; it defeats every attempt to explain. Well, if that is so in the human realm, the Divine is infinite in its range above the human. To explain in terms of love why God, with all His perfect knowledge, knowing the end from the beginning, set His hand to make us, is not the easiest thing. Indeed, I think we are at the depth of mystery."

We were made for the heart of God. This is a mystery. We will probably never know why. Furthermore, the mystery gets deeper as we go on. That is as it should be. "There is always," says Sparks, "a mystery about love."

Love is a mystery. This also implies that life is a mystery, which is another thing the Holy Spirit has told me frequently over the past several years.

Sparks continues:

"Oh, the mystery of God's love! Will you tell me it is not true that the universe has at its very center a heart that loves? Well, think again and go back to your Old Testament."

Go back to your Old Testament, says Sparks. If you follow Sparks' recommendation, you will see time and time again the incredible power of God's love at work in human hearts. God's heart is pure love. Jesus possesses this heart. If we allow Him to transform our heart, God - through Jesus - will make our lives shine.

The universe has at its very center a heart that loves! That's the key to understanding the Bible. How many Christians truly understand this? How many people realize that at the very center of the universe is a heart that loves - God's awesome heart? How many people comprehend a heart that can overcome anything, anytime, anywhere? A heart that is capable of loving everything in the universe - unconditionally, now and forever. A loving heart that knows no bounds.

Somewhere along the way, Christianity became corrupted by dark hearts. A few hundred years after Jesus walked the earth, man found a way to turn back the spiritual clock. In due time, religious people once again gained power and authority, but this time they did it in the name of the Lord. Religious Christians became killers - in the name of Jesus no less! The heart of Christ - a heart full of God's love - began to vanish from Christianity. Sadly, this trend continues today.

Lest you think I'm getting carried away, open up your Bible and take a close look at Matthew 23. Jesus knew the corrupting nature of religious hearts. He had full knowledge of the darkness that exists inside a religious heart. He knows religious people are incapable of walking in love. Jesus exposed the dark religious hearts of the Pharisees. Matthew 23 is full of harsh words for religious people. One of the most powerful criticisms of religion is contained in Matthew 23:27-28. In the Scripture, the Lord says:

Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness. (Matthew 23:27-28)

"Whitewashed tombs ... full of dead men's bones and everything unclean." In my humble opinion, that's the best description of a religious heart in the whole the Bible. A heart full of hypocrisy and wickedness. This description fits a lot of Christians I see on TV and hear on the radio today. The religious heart is on display 24/7/365 in your family room in living color. Tragically, these same dark hearts are on display in many churches around the country and throughout the world.

When I look out at the world and look at the hearts of people that call themselves Christians, I don't see many loving hearts. I see religious hearts. I see the same kind of hearts that the Pharisees possessed. They same kind of hearts the Lord exposed that were recorded in the Book of Matthew.

"Dead men's bones and everything unclean."

Ouch!

A heart full of God's love is not a religious heart - it's a spiritual heart. God is Spirit (John 4:24). God is love (1 John 4:8). A religious heart is a dark and dead heart. A heart full of God's love is a heart fully alive! It's the most loving heart you will ever encounter in the universe. It's the kind of heart that "always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres" (1 Corinthians 13:7).

I love the fact that Jesus chose a Pharisee - Saul of Tarsus, a once proud religious killer of Christians - to spread the gospel. How beautiful our Lord is. Poor Saul had no idea what happened to his religious heart. He was blinded. He was stunned. But when he realized what had happened - that he had received the revelation of Jesus and was blessed with the Holy Spirit - everything changed. Over time, his dark, religious heart was transformed to light, love and Life. Can you see the awesome power of God's heart? It can take a dark religious heart like Saul's and transform it into a loving heart.

The heart of God is the greatest heart of all. God sent His Son into the world so that we could, through Him, possess the most loving heart in the universe. Saul of Tarsus had a dark religious heart. The Apostle Paul had a bright spiritual heart full of God's love.

God's heart is a heart that never dies. It can't die. The Pharisees thought they could kill Jesus' heart, but they were sadly mistaken. We are reminded of this fact every year when we celebrate the awesome power of God's love to raise Jesus from the dead.

When everything else perishes, God's loving heart will still be there, right at the center of the universe.

You may ask, what kind of heart does God and His Son have? The Apostle Paul gave us the best description of all. God's heart is patient. It is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It is not rude. It is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. God's heart does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. This is the what Paul told the Corinthians.

Take a look around at all the people that call themselves Christians today and examine their hearts. How many hearts do you know today that are patient, kind, don't envy, aren't jealous or proud, are not rude, not self-seeking, not easily angered, and keep no record of wrong doing?

How many hearts like that do you know? Many people know about Jesus' heart, but they don't have His heart. Their hearts are independent of God's loving heart. God wants us to have the heart of Christ. That's why He allowed Jesus to be crucified. He did this so we could know - once and for all - that nothing - not even religion - could kill His loving heart. His love cannot be killed. It cannot die. The heart of God will always rise from the dead. Always!

The Lord told us that people would know we are His disciples by the kind of hearts we possessed - by our Spiritual fruit. The heart of Christ is a heart full of Spiritual fruit - a heart full of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23).

Sparks says that we were made for the heart of God. This is a great mystery. Love is a mystery.

May we learn to appreciate God's great mystery of love and may we surrender our hearts to the Lord and allow His loving heart to shine through us.

Agape,

Steve