How far must love go?

In my devotions this morning, I read Ephesians 1:15: “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints” (NIV).

I was startled by the way “love” was qualified. It was not a love for Christians like me, or for those in my group, and certainly not for those Christians who agree with me. The love of the Ephesians was a love for all the saints.”

In chapter two, the author touches on how hard it was to get to that universal love. The Ephesian saints were originally split between those who came from a Jewish background, and those who did not. Yet, they had matured to where they loved across those theological, cultural, and ethnic divides.

The arresting question that came to me this morning is “does that mean my ‘love’ is not really love unless it is a universal love — a love for all the saints?”

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