February 29God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him — 1 John 4:16.
Justice fills the measure full, but love shakes it, presses it down, heaps it up and overflows justice. It is therefore something not to be demanded, nor its lack to be complained of, but to be gratefully appreciated as a favor and to be generously reciprocated. Everyone who craves it at all should crave it in its highest sense—the sense of admiration and reverence. But this sort of love is the most costly, and the only way to secure it is to manifest that nobility of character which calls it forth from others who are truly noble—Z '02, 266 (R 3070). The highest characteristic of Jehovah's attributes is love working in harmony with wisdom, justice and power. To dwell in love is to continue in its exercise, subjecting all the faculties of heart and mind to its sway in harmony with wisdom, justice and power. Such dwell in God, because only when self-will is surrendered and God's will is taken instead can such conduct result, and such conduct persisted in fills the heart with the Divine love and thus God by His Spirit dwells in such as so do—P '33, 163. Parallel passages: Deut. 4:37; Psa. 63:3; 146:8; Jer. 31:3; John 3:16; Rom. 5:8; 1 John 3:1; Psa. 31:23; 73:25, 26; 91:14; Rom. 8:28; John 14:15, 21, 23; 16:27; 1 Cor. 16:22; 2 Cor. 5:14; John 3:34, 35; 15:12, 13; Rom. 12:9, 10; Matt. 5:41-47; 19:19. Hymns: 39, 95, 114, 198, 165, 194, 166. Poems of Dawn, 290: God's Boundless Love. Tower Reading: Z '11, 421 (R 4917). Questions: What have been the week's experiences in line with this text? What helped or hindered therein? In what did they result? |
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GOD'S BOUNDLESS LOVE
COULD we with ink the ocean fill,
Were every blade of grass a quill,
Were all the world of parchment made
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
COULD we with ink the ocean fill,
Were every blade of grass a quill,
Were all the world of parchment made
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.