Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister. (I John 4:7-12, 19-21)
Loving Father,
Your message cannot be more clear. Teach these children that the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. How they treat people, particularly fellow Christians, means everything. Unless they can love their brother and sister whom they see and live around on a regular basis, they cannot claim that they love you. Any many Christian brothers and sisters are hard to love. But our command is to love them as you have loved us. Give these children an unflinching focus on this principle.
Amen
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