We have often heard God is love. Truly love is God. Love is godly. There is no life without love. Our pilgrimage in this world without love is a journey in a barren desert without any destination. Love is the only virtue or quality that is worth living for and worth dying for. St. Paul, the great hater of Christ who became the great lover of him and his teachings, wrote the best panegyric on love that I know: “So faith, hope,love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. Make love your aim (I Corinthians, 13: 13 – 14: 1).” There is no God or religion without faith; there is no relationship without faith or trust; no hope or despair leads to suicide; yet love surpasses faith and hope. Love is the greatest source of energy. It is the greatest motivator.It recognizes no nations, no boundaries, no religions, no castes, no races, no languages. It is beyond all that. It recognizes only humans wherever they are, and loves and accepts them unconditionally for who they are. It is universal. It alone unites humanity.The greatest commandment tells us to love God with our whole being, and to love our fellow humans as we love ourselves. It contains all the scriptures and all the sages and prophets.The great slogan of the anti-war protesters in the USA, who brought an end to the Vietnam war, was: “Make love, not war”.
Life without love is utterly meaningless. The whole creation pulsates with life and love. It beckons us to love. The flower that blooms, the bird that sings, the child that smiles - everything in creation speaks of love, sustains us in love. The whole universe is a testimony of God’s love. What can we in return give back to this world from which we have received so much love? How can we love more today than yesterday, more this hour than the last hour? Our aim needs to be to live in love, to breathe love, and to move in love.
Swami Snehananda Jyoti
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