Hatred stirs up dissention, but love covers all wrongs.
________
V. 18
Whoever hides hatred with lying lips ... is a fool.
26: 26
Enemies ... whose hatred is covered by deceit ...
8: 36
... All they that hate [Wisdom] love death.
________
I John 4: 10-11
This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as the atoning Sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
I Peter 4:8
Above all things, love one another with fervent love, for love covers a multitude of sins.
Matthew 6: 12, 14-15
And forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors.
For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
So what is hatred, what is love, and what's the connection with forgiveness?
Hatred has been called the opposite of love, as they are frequently contrasted.
But both hatred and love can be very passionate, alive feelings.
We know what love is by the way God has demonstrated His love for us, in sacrificing His most dear for our benefit; by sending His Son to take our death, individually, so His blood could wash us clean from sin, and God can now forgive us. So Love is sacrificial, to the end of forgiveness.
God's forgiveness results from our being cleansed from every fault, made perfect, fit to live with Him in His home, Heaven.
So our love for one another must also require that we forgive one another. To refuse to forgive is to carry a grudge, which hurts only ourselves, and projects hatred toward the offender.
John calls himself, "the disciple Jesus loved," and his letters lay out his understanding of the principle of Love. He says,
I John 2:9-11
Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.
So the one who forgives and does not carry that grievance, but lets it go; that one is walking in God's enlightenment. But the one who carries the grudge is still walking in darkness, and doesn't realize what they're doing, or God's great love for them.
Forgiveness is the test of love. To sacrifice for and forgive is to love as God loves us. Anything else is just human love, or even hatred.
I think the opposite of both passionate hatred and passionate love is apathy, no passion at all. God noticed that the church in Laodicea was neither cold nor hot: I would rather you be cold or hot. So then, because you are luke-warm (apathetic), I will vomit you up out of my mouth. (Revelation 3:14-16).
(There's not much that makes God feel an upset stomach, but apathy is one. For other things, just do a search on "abomination.")
O my Father, thank You so much for Your great Love! You have done everything you possibly could do to show Your Love for us, in drawing us with Your kindness, and sacrificing Your very best and most beloved so that we could be made fit to live with You in Heaven.
You want us to be with You, as Jesus said in the seventeenth chapter of John: Father, I will that they also, whom You have given to Me, be with Me where I am, that they may see My Glory... (17:24).
Teach us all how to love one another as You have loved us, Father. Show each one of us how to see one another with Your eyes, to forgive as You have forgiven us, and to celebrate each others' good qualities while forgiving and letting our faults slide into the background.
Father, You have loved me with such great, passionate Love, that You call me the Bride of Christ, to be Your bride throughout all eternity; to have that tender, close relationship of a Bridegroom and bride on their honeymoon, lasting throughout all eternity, forever and ever!
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
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