Pursue Love

1 Corinthians 14:1

Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts,  but especially that you may prophesy.

In today’s world, many things have been twisted around, priorities inverted, needs redefined, perspectives warped and so on. As believers, we should remain on course, allowing the Word of God to help us live in righteousness and truth. Righteousness is not just a right standing with God; it’s things as they should be. Jesus told Pilate:

…“You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” John 18:37 (Emphasis added)

Earlier on, David had said;

Mercy and truth have met together; Righteousness and peace have kissed. Truth shall spring out of the earth, and righteousness shall look down from heaven. Psalm 85:10-11

John said:

For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. John 1:17

Jesus came to reveal how God wants and has always wanted things, to reveal God’s heart and perspective concerning everything. This is why He spoke widely about and against many things, from money, prayer, fasting, forgiveness, faith in God, how to treat others, how to walk and talk and so on. By the time He came, the truth and righteousness of God (how things should be) had been covered by darkness (ignorance, separation from God), which is why prophet Isaiah, in talking about the coming of the Messiah, talked of darkness covering the earth, and deep darkness its people, but the Lord will arise over us (Is. 60:2). Darkness here symbolises ignorance, and separation from God. So Jesus came to bring truth, and restore things to the way God wants them.

One of the things Jesus spoke clearly on was our need to walk in love. In those days, just like today, priorities were twisted and inverted, and people pursued what they shouldn’t, neglecting what they should pursue. Look around today; even amongst believers, people are pursuing wealth, statuses, names, power, financial security and so on. Who told them to pursue these things? Everyone but the Word of God. There's no place we're told to pursue these things; on the contrary, we're told to pursue these things:

...but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. 2 Timothy 2:22

Jesus also told us to seek first God’s kingdom and His righteousness, and all the other things we need (then talking of food and clothes) will be added to us (Matt. 6:33). Is this the picture you see in the church today? Truly we’ve allowed the world to redefine our priorities for us, as Jesus said that it’s the heathens/pagans who seek after these things (Matt. 6:32), which explains why many of our prayer requests, sermons et al are all about wealth, riches and so on. How much of our prayers revolve around these, as opposed to revolving around the need for us to walk in love, faith, peace, love and righteousness? So, from the look of things, what are we pursuing as the church, largely?

Today I want to focus on the need for us to pursue love, what it means, and how we can do it. It’s time we as the body of Christ started pursuing what matters to Him, and what He's told us to pursue, prioritising it, and trusting Him to take care of our needs.

Love is very important to God. He's all about love; actually He is love (1 Jn. 4:8,16). Our salvation began from love:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. John 3:16

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8

We love Him because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19

We heard of God’s love for us, believed it and Him, then started loving Him. The moment we believed, something happened inside us:

… the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. Romans 5:5

The Holy Spirit came in us, and poured out God’s love in our hearts. This should show us how important love is to God. Why did He do this? So that we can be able to be like Him, our Father, Who is all about love. This is why we're told:

Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma. Ephesians 5:1-2

Everything Jesus did was out of love, from His coming, life on earth, exit from earth and so on. We're supposed to follow in His footsteps, Him being our Shepherd, Lord, Saviour, King and all:

Righteousness will go before Him, and shall make His footsteps our pathway. Psalms 85:13

Our lives and heartbeat should be to manifest the love of God that has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, do all we do out of love. The quest to make this happen is what “pursuing love” is all about. God didn’t pour His love on our hearts so that we can use love; it’s so that love can use us. Let me explain; picture yourself having a glass/basin/tank of water. You use this water, and have control over it. Now picture yourself in a vast river/ocean; here, you don’t use the water, as literally it's more than you can handle. It’s safe to say that there’s a possibility of the water using you, literally, in this situation, as it's more than you can handle. In the same way, if God told us that He gave us some amount of love, then it would be safe to say that we use love, which can be explained by us not being able to love as we should. However, God poured out (other translations talk of Him “shedding forth”) His love on our hearts. This isn't merely putting some drops of love in our hearts; it’s saturating our hearts with His love. This way, if we get out of the way and surrender, love will use us. These are instances where we find ourselves doing things that we are sure we wouldn’t be able to do on our own, viz. forgive, not fight back, repay evil with good, give, serve etc. I'm sure we all had such instances, where we look back and say, “I can’t believe that was me,” loving, forgiving, showing mercy, giving, serving etc.. So, let me ask you, what did you do for you to get the strength and ability to do that? I'm sure it was nothing much, except to surrender to God and obey. This was love using you. Now you can imagine what will happen when we live a life of constantly surrendering to God and by extension love (God is love), where now all we do is not limited to our natural abilities, but to the power of God’s love. Since nothing is impossible with God (Lk. 1:37), nothing is impossible with love, since God is love. As long as love is our driving force, we can do all things.

Many people even in the church pursue spiritual gifts, ministries and so on. After telling us about ministries and gifts of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:30), Paul tells us to desire spiritual gifts, but he will show us a more excellent way (1 Cor. 12:31). Excellent of way of doing what? Of attaining spiritual gifts. Immediately after saying this, he delves into talking about love. The more excellent way of attaining spiritual gifts and ministries is the way of love. After talking about love and its characteristics and all (1 Cor. 13), he now tells us to pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts. Many have it twisted, and are pursuing spiritual gifts, desiring love. For this reason, whatever they do even after acquiring these gifts is as sounding brass and clanging symbols (noise before God), and profits them nothing, as they still don’t have love.

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. I Corinthians 13:1-3

Love gives whatever we do meaning, and the absence of it in our lives and actions renders everything meaningless. That is how important love is, to God, and how it should be, to an extent that we make it our number one pursuit. Love drove Christ to come to earth, do all He did all the way to the grave and Sheol, and it will help us live as He lived, if only we pursue it. As we make love our pursuit, always desiring to walk in love and do all we do out of love, God will show us ways of expressing it, and in most cases these ways will manifest in form of spiritual gifts, where we find ourselves healing, performing miracles, prophesying, giving words of wisdom and knowledge, and so on, as love will use us and show us how to solve whatever problem or need we see.

This life of love began when we accepted Christ, and should continue, where we allow Him to love us, showing us how love works, then we reciprocate it to others:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35

Imagine how life would be if all believers loved others the way Christ has loved and loves them. It would be so easy to preach and win souls! For this to happen, we have to intentionally and purposefully pursue love, where we seek to see love reign in our lives, being the driving force of all we do, just as it is God's.

Let's go back to Ephesians 5:1-2, to see how to pursue love:

Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma. Ephesians 5:1-2

The easiest way to ensure we walk in love at all times, letting love have its way in us and use us, is by focusing on Christ, asking ourselves at all times, “what would Jesus do”? Better yet, asking Jesus what He'd do in every situation, since He's always with us. The more we behold Jesus, through the Word, the more we're transformed into the same image, from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18). As we also purpose in our hearts to always walk in love, thus pursuing love, God will show us how to walk in love, viz. what to do, where, when, with and to who, and so on. It all starts with us setting our hearts to pursue love, and letting love reign in our lives. It’s interesting that the same word translated to "pursue" in 1 Cor 14:1, our opening text, as well as 2 Tim. 2:22, is the same word that was translated to “press”, when Paul was talking of pressing towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:14). So it’s actively pressing, following, running after love, to an extent that we see it reign in our hearts and lives.

It all starts with an understanding of how walking in love is important to God, then making it our life-goal to walk in the love of God. The place to start is understanding that we cannot give what we don’t have, and we cannot adequately use what we’re not acquainted with. Understand that you have the same ability Jesus had while on earth, to walk in love; His Spirit having poured God’s love in your heart. You can do everything everyday out of love - loving your enemies, blessing those who curse you, doing good to those who hate you, praying for those who spitefully use you and persecute you - just like Jesus, and therefore be perfect, just as our Father in heaven is perfect (see Matt. 6:44-48). Jesus told His disciples to love as He had loved them, as we have seen (Jn. 13:34-35). He didn’t tell them this the day He met them afresh, but rather towards the end of His ministry, after He had revealed His love to them, what it is, how it manifests and so on. The fact that they didn’t ask Him, “How have you loved us?” shows us that they had a clear picture of Christ’s love, and hence knew what He was asking them to do. Today, God is asking us to love others as He has loved us. If we don’t know how much He’s loved us, or haven’t been paying attention, we’ll have a problem loving others and God as He wants us to. The best way to love God’s way is to learn from Him, then do as we learn.

This is where a childlike attitude comes in. A child never assumes they know anything, especially about life; they do what they see grownups do, especially the parents. They imitate everything they see. This is why, as we have seen, the Bible tells us to, “Therefore be imitators of God as dear children.” Eph. 5:1. We are to imitate everything we see Him do, like children; so, we are to forgive as He has forgiven us, show mercy as He has shown us mercy, be kind to others as He has been kind to us, love as He has loved us and so on. What would happen if we all treated others exactly as God treats us? God would be seen through each and every one of us! Every act of love in obedience to God’s Word is a manifestation of God Himself, as God is love. If we all made our lives about passing forward what God is passing to us, setting our hearts to receive His love and pass it on, we’d be seeing more expressions of God’s love to and for us, and more opportunities to express God’s love to others. This is pursuing love, and is the solution to many of the world’s problems. As someone said, the world doesn’t need more power, it needs more love.

I pray to see believers doing good to others even though these people have wronged them a million times, treating them with love, as love covers a multitude of sins (1 Pet. 4:8). I pray to see believers quickly forgiving, and when asked, they say, “I was forgiven too.” I pray to see believers extending grace and mercy to the undeserving, and when asked, they say, “God has shown me grace and mercy too, as undeserving as I am.” I pray to see believers loving the ‘unloveable’, and when asked they say, “I’m the most unloveable person, yet God still loves me in spite of me.” I pray to see all believers giving as God gives us, with no conditions or strings attached, out of love. All this will happen as we all open ourselves to be imitators of God as dear children, and walk in love, as He showed, shows and will show us.

Grace and peace to you!

    Sam Gitonga

Sunday Service Teaching, Transformation Ministry, Ruiru. 


Sam is the Youth Leader at Teaching Transformation Ministry. We are located along the Thika-Ruai Flyover Junction (at the Thika Rd./ Bypass intersection), Next to Eastgate Restaurant.