“Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:1)

 Here Paul calls us to imitate the God who is love by walking in the way of love.  But we can only respond to this call as “dearly loved children”. Only as we know the depths of God’s love for us can we begin to love as He loves us.  And we do know God’s love because it has been demonstrated in God’s Son who gave himself up for us.  Furthermore, the same love has been poured into our hearts by the Spirit. Let us, then, settle for nothing less than knowing God in love through the Son and in the Spirit aware that we can never get enough of it.

Everything else that is required of me in life-my love of God, myself and others-all flows out of my personal knowing of God’s extravagant love for me in Christ by the Spirit. With the Son before me and the Spirit within me I am now called to live as a dearly loved child and walk the way of love. And yet not I, for Christ himself lives in me loving in me and through me as the one who loved me and gave himself for me.