Henry Scougal wrote an amazing letter to a friend that was turned into a book. The title is The Life of God in the Soul of Man. Here is a quote he gave on love. Scougal died at the age of 27.
"Love must needs be miserable, and full of trouble and disquietude, when there is not worth and excellency enough in the object to answer the vastness of its capacity...nothing below an infinite good can afford room to stretch itself, and exert its vigour and activity. What is a little skin-deep beauty, or some small degrees of goodness, to match or satisfy a passion which was made for God; designed to embrace an infinite God?"
I have been thinking much about the "active love of God". Many times I make the mistake of viewing His love almost as this "impersonal force" that is pursuing me instead of seeing the relational reality that His intimate love is designed to mainly lead me to Himself, which will naturally overflow in the love for others.
In fact, this will allow me to love others the way that He does instead of loving others in order that they return love back to me. I believe this is the focus He gives us when He tells us to even love our enemies. The point is not that we just "grit our teeth" and do it because He said, but it is because this is the same love He had for us when we were enemies of Him (see Romans 5:10).
What are some thoughts that you have on the "active love of God"?
Love Truth
Vernon
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