This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. (1 John 3:11, NIV)
"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (John 13:34-35, NIV)
Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. (1 Peter 4:8, NIV)
Sacrificial Love
Like Jesus
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. (1 John 3:16, NIV)
and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. (Ephesians 5:2, NIV)
Means our possessions, our time, our talents are to be given to other Christians
If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? (1 John 3:17, NIV)
cf Early Church
Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. (Acts 2:45, NIV)
Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. (James 2:15-17, NIV)
Active Love
Deeds not words
Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. (1 John 3:18, NIV)
A Sign that we are Christians
This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence (1 John 3:19, NIV)
And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us. (1 John 3:23-24, NIV)
