Discourse on God (YHWH) is Love:

Discourse on God (YHWH) is Love:

1 John 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. (American Standard Version; ASV)

All of God's (YHWH's) attributes are outstanding, perfect, and appealing. But the most endearing quality of God (YHWH) is love. Nothing else can draw so strongly to God (YHWH) as his love. Happily, love is also his dominant quality. Now how do we know that?

The Bible says something about love that it never does about his other attributes. The scriptures never say that God (YHWH) is power or that God (YHWH) is justice or even that God (YHWH) is wisdom; although he possess all these attributes. He, in fact, is the ultimate source of all three.

However, with respect love, something more profound is said at 1 John 4:8, quoted before, "God is love." Yes, love runs very deeply in God (YHWH). It is his very essence or nature.

We might consider it this way (1) God's (YHWH's) power enables him to act; (2) His justice and wisdom guide the way he acts; but most important, his love is always reflected in the way he uses his other attributes.

He is the very personification of love. Therefore, True Christians want to learn about God (YHWH). Now let's consider some of the aspects of God's (YHWH's) matchless love.

His greatest act of love was sending his only begotten Son, the first of creation per Colossians 1:15, "Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature." (Authorized King James Bible; AV), to suffer and die for us. This can safely be said to be the greatest act of love in all history. Why is this?

The Bible as previously quoted at Colossians 1:15, says, "the firstborn of every creature;" Just think the Creator, God's (YHWH's) Son who was in existence before the physical universe, but not before God (YHWH) who had no beginning, can you imagine. How long before the universe was created was Jesus (Yeshua) created, the Bible does not state. This son had for untold times served as God's (YHWH's) 'master worker' per Proverbs 8:30, "Then I was beside Him, {as} a master workman; And I was daily {His} delight, Rejoicing always before Him, " (ASV); and John 1:3, "All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being." (ASV), thus God (YHWH) and his Son worked together to bring all else into existence.

Therefore they had a very strong bond; they are united by the strongest bond of love ever known. Nevertheless, God (YHWH) sent his Son, Jesus (Yeshua) to earth to be born as a human. This was a great sacrifice of love on his part, and on one occasion he spoke fro heaven saying, Matthew 3:17, "and lo, a voice out of the heavens, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.." (ASV).

While on earth, Jesus (Yeshua) faithfully carried out his Father's (YHWH's) directions. Yet, he let his Son be betrayed, and executed to fulfill prophecy, and be for a period no longer in existence. Since God (YHWH) has feelings, the pain he must have suffered over the death of his Son is beyond the power of our words to express. Why did he permit this to happen? This is revealed as an act of great love for mankind at John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life." (ASV). So God's (YHWH's) motives amounted to pure love. No greater love has ever been shown.

Now, how can we tell who are the faithful footstep followers of Jesus (Yeshua) Christ? Easily by their example of love. As Jesus (Yeshua) testified to at Matthew 5:43-44, "Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy: 44 but I say unto you, love your enemies, and pray for them that persecute you;" (ASV); And at, Matthew 22:39, "And a second like [unto it] is this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." (ASV): and at Mark 12:31, "The second is this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these" (ASV); And at Luke 6:27, "But I say unto you that hear, Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you," (ASV).

Thus those doing these things are the faithful footstep followers of Jesus (Yeshua) God's (YHWH's) only begotten Son, second only to God (HYWH) [not coequal] in heaven after his Father (YHWH) resurrected him as affirmed at 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, "For I delivered unto you first of all that which also I received: that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4 and that he was buried; and that he hath been raised on the third day according to the scriptures; 5 and that he appeared to Cephas; then to the twelve; 6 then he appeared to above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain until now, but some are fallen asleep; 7 then he appeared to James; then to all the apostles; 8 and last of all, as to the [child] untimely born, he appeared to me also." (ASV).

Clearly, then, if any group hates, persecutes, and kills others, it is NOT of God (YHWH) since it has been shown, "for God is love"; therefore, it is of God's (YHWH's) arch enemy as shown at 2 Corinthians 4:4, "in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn [upon them]." (ASV).

Now the choice is each persons, do we go to God's (YHWH's) side and take on his chief attribute of love or do we attach ourselves to a group that has hated, persecuted, and killed others without just cause, i.e., a group belonging to the god of this system. Only you can make that choice for yourself.

APPENDIX:

(1) "[RATSACH] is a purely Hebrew term. It has no clear cognate in any of the contemporary tongues. The root occurs thirty -eight times in the OT, with fourteen occurrences in Num 35. The initial use of the root appears in the Ten Commandments (Exo 20:13). In that important text it appears in the
simple Qal stem with the negative adverb, "You shall not murder, " being a more precise reading than the too-general KJV "thou shalt not kill." Much has been made of the fact that the root r¹faµ appears in the Mosaic legislation, as though this term bore a special connotation of premeditation, as though the Decalogue only proscribed premeditated crime.

This is not the case, The many occurrences in Num 35 deal with the organization of the six cities of refuge to which manslayers who killed a person accidentally could flee. Numbers 35:11 makes completely clear that the refuge was for those guilty of unpremeditated, accidental killings.
This makes clear that [RATSACH] applies equally to both cases of premeditated murder and killings as a result of any other circumstances, what English Common Law has called, "man slaughter." The root also describes killing for revenge (Num 35:27, 30) and assassination (2Kings 6:32). It appears in a few poetic contexts, as an "A" word in a peculiar parallel construction (Job 24:14); as an "A" word parallel to a general term for immorality, zimma (Hos 6:9); as a "B" word parallel to another synonym "to kill, " "to slay" (Psa 94:6). In only one case in the whole OT is the root used of the killing of man by an animal (Prov 22:13). But even in that context it is the enormity and horror of the deed which is primary. In all other cases of the use of [RATSACH], it is man's crime against man and God's censure of it which is uppermost. W.W."

* Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, Harris. L. R, Archer G.L, Waltke B. K, 1980

(2) A comparison of several versions of the Bible gives the following is the result.

Ex. 20:13
Murder: CEV ESV TEV GW LITV NASB MSG NWT NIV NKJV NLT NRSV WEB,
Rotherham, YLT, Byington, Goodspeed, ISR, Concordant

Kill: Darby, KJ21, KJV, MKJV, NJB, RSV, NET, Brenton, AKJV, RNKJV,
Revised Webster,

Mark 10:19
Murder: CEV HCSB EMTV ESV TEV GW LITV NASB MSG NET NWT NIV NKJV NLT
NRSV WEB Weymouth Montgomery, 21st Century NT, Rotherham, YLT,
Byington, Goodspeed, Christian Bible, Concordant

Kill: Darby, Diaglott, KJ21, KJV, MKJV, NJB, RSV, AKJV, Murdoch,
RNKJV, RVIC, Revised Webster, 20th Century NT,

It seems the MURDERS have it, and the NET Bible seems to be
inconsistent as it moves from the Exodus (kill) to the NT (murder).

(3) In an essay on capitol punishment talk show host and Jewish theologian Dennis Prager highlighted the difference between "murder" and the broader term of "killing". He wrote: "As William F. Buckley Jr. has argued, if capitol punishment is state murder, then imprisonment is state kidnapping. Many opponents of capitol punishment claim not to grasp the moral distinction between the murder of an innocent person and the execution of a murderer. This reductionist mode of thinking (moral equivalence) has come to dominate opposition to capitol punishment. thus, the head of Amnesty International-USA has called the United
States "a serial killer" because it executes murderers. To put it succinctly, this claim that the murder of an innocent and the execution of the murderer are morally equivalent because they both involve taking a life is as morally perverse as a claim that rape and lovemakeing are morally equivalent because both involve sexual intercourse. (That some prominent radical feminists, such as Andrea Dworkin, make such a claim doesn't diminish its moral perversity, it only illustrates the prevalence of moral equivalence and moral illiteracy in our time.)" While I don't agree with them, I can see how a soldier that is a member of Christendom might seek to justify the killing of Saddam and his thugs. But how do they justify or rationalize the killing of innocent men women and children who get caught in the crossfire or are mistaken as the enemy? I've asked people before that tried to rationalize military service which army would Jesus or the Apostles join if they were on earth today? Christians are to follow Christ example. As someone wanting to follow his footsteps as close as possable I need to know so I can sign up. I never have received an
answer.

Your Friend in Christ Iris89