WHAT JESUS SAID ABOUT LOVE
In Mark 12:28 a teacher of religious law asked Jesus which of all the commandments was the most important to follow. Jesus mentioned two commandments – one from Deuteronomy 6:5 and the other from Leviticus 19:18. Both had to do with love. Why is love so important? Jesus said that all of the commandments were given for two simple reasons: to help us love God and love others as we should.
| What else did Jesus say about love? | Reference |
| God loves us | John 3:16 |
| We are to love God | Matthew 22:37 |
| Because God loves us, he cares for us | Matthew 6:25-34 |
| God wants everyone to know how much he loves them | John 17:23 |
| God loves even those who hate him; we are to do the same | Matt 5:43-47; Luke 6:35 |
| God seeks out even those most alienated from him | Luke 15 |
| God must be our first love | Matt 6:24; 10:37 |
| We love God when we obey him | John 14:21; 15:10 |
| God loves Jesus, his Son | John 5:20; 10:17 |
| Jesus loves God | John 14:31 |
| Those who refuse Jesus don’t have God’s love | John 5:41-44 |
| Jesus loves us just as God loves Jesus | John 15:9 |
| Jesus proved his love for us by dying on the cross so that we could live eternally with him | John 3:14-15; 15:13-14 |
| The love between God and Jesus is the perfect example of how we are to love others | John 17:21-26 |
| We are to love one another (John 13:34-35) and demonstrate that love | Matthew 5:40-42; 10:42 |
| We are not to love the praise of people (John 12:43), selfish recognition (Matt 23:6-7), earthly belongings (Luke 6:20-31). or anything more than God | Luke 16:13 |
| Jesus loves extends to each individual | Mark 10:21; John 10:11-15 |
| Jesus wants us to love him through both good and difficult times | Matt 26:31-35 |
| Jesus wants our love to be genuine | John 21:15-17 |
1 Corinthians 13 ( Love is the Greatest )
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.
Galatians 5:7-15 NKJV ( Love Fulfills the Law )
You ran well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? 8 This persuasion does not come from Him who calls you. 9 A little leaven leavens the whole lump. 10 I have confidence in you, in the Lord, that you will have no other mind; but he who troubles you shall bear his judgment, whoever he is. 11 And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased. 12 I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off! 13 For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. 14 For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 But if you bite and devour one another, beware lest you be consumed by one another!