Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love. Ephesians 5:1-2.
Today your LORD (יהוה) God (אלהים) says:
Walking in the Spirit is walking in love. I tell you to imitate Me, that is, act like Me, as My beloved children and walk in love. This would sound strange to many, even believers, that they are able to imitate Me and be like Me, but you will not be truly happy with a joy no one can take from you until you are acting like Me because that is your true nature. I created you from within Myself and made you in My image and according to My likeness. That is why people seek love and if they are not loved, even little babies die when they have no one to love and hold them. I am love and hold you in My everlasting arms. I am the God of all comfort. I think, talk and walk in love. Everything else is foreign to Me and cannot enter Me.
There is no darkness in Me at all. Love casts out all fear, anxiety, ill will, hatred, bitterness, depression—anything that takes you away from light into darkness is contrary to love and will not make you happy, love and light go together and I am both.
Walking in love is the most delightful and most powerful way to live. It joins you as one in Spirit with Me, who am love, and makes you undefeatable by Satan. How is that? There is no entrance for evil in a heart committed to love. Satan is no match for the Spirit of love because darkness cannot overcome light, lies cannot prevail over truth, and hatred can never prevail over true love.
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:37-39.
It is My love for you in which all true love is borne, sustained, and maintained.
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 4:10.
It is My love that bonds you together in love with Me and with others who have come to know and believe in the love that I have for each one of you. All will know you as My disciples by your love for one another. And that bond of love grows greater and greater as you leave the sin and corruption of this world and enjoy the fullness of My love in My Kingdom where nothing else can enter but love. You are surrounded even now, you who believe, by a cloud of witnesses to My love and My goodness living as saints in the light. And their love and interest in you is so great that they carry before Me golden bowls filled with incense that are your prayers held up by them before Me.
And I saw in the midst of the throne (with the four living creatures) and the elders a Lamb standing, as if slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God, sent out into all the earth. And He came and took the scroll out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne. When He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are You to take the scroll and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth.” Revelation 5:6-10.
Love is goodness and kindness but love is also righteousness and justice. Love has no respect or tolerance for sin. Why? Sin tears down but love upbuilds. When sinners came to Jesus He led them to repentance, forgiveness, and no condemnation, for He did not come to judge the world but to save it, but He never condoned sin. In fact, in His great love He would admonish them to avoid sin and to not sin any longer so something worse did not overtake them.
But the man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away while there was a crowd in that place. Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you.” John 5:13-14.
Moses wanted to know Me beyond all the astounding miracles I did, He wanted to see My glory, to see who I was, to know Me even as I knew him and called him My friend. And how did I explain Myself to Him? First as the One who is, who was and who is to come. The One to whom time was no hindrance and the future held no fear. The One who knew all and took care of all things. A God of Covenant promises who carried out all He promised. A living God who was right there with them who answered their every cry and request. A God who prospered them and loved them beyond love. A God who wanted to dwell among them, lead them, and travel among them.
And how did I reveal and describe to Him who I am?
The LORD descended in the cloud and stood there with him as he called upon the name of the LORD. Then the LORD passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.” Exodus 34:5-7.
And this was the first time that I had talked about who I am to anyone. Before, like Abraham, people knew Me as the One who did wonders for them.
God spoke further to Moses and said to him, “I am the LORD and I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as God Almighty (El Shaddai), but by My name, LORD (יהוה), I did not make Myself known to them. I also established My covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land in which they sojourned. Furthermore I have heard the groaning of the sons of Israel, because the Egyptians are holding them in bondage, and I have remembered My covenant. Say, therefore, to the sons of Israel, ‘I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from their bondage. I will also redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. Then I will take you for My people, and I will be your God; and you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will bring you to the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you for a possession; I am the LORD.’” Exodus 6:2-8.
I introduced Myself by what I would do for them and what I was giving them, this is the way I blessed and addressed man from the beginning, My attention being, as it still is, entirely focused on the person I spoke with and the blessings I was bestowing upon them and the answers I was giving them to fulfill their needs and desires. But Moses, like David and Paul, was different. He wanted to know My Name and he wanted to know Me. He was interested in Me more than anything else. He was not even interested in going to the beautiful land I promised them if I did not go with them.
Then Moses said to the LORD, “If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?” Exodus 33:15-16.
It was My presence he wanted more than life. He had watched My goodness, seen My power, and walked in My presence and that was everything his heart desired. He had found love and he loved that love that was Me. And so I entrusted My Word to him, My written Word, that became the Torah and began the scrolls of the Covenant book, the Bible. And, O, what great respect and awe he had in the power of My life giving Word. He wanted it always before the eyes of every person for whom he was responsible as their leader to the Promised Land.
But back to My Word on who I am, for if you are to imitate Me you will find helpful guidance herein.
First, I open with My Covenant Name, “The LORD (יהוה), the LORD (יהוה) God (אלהים),” which is only for those who know Me. LORD. I AM, I was and I am to come. It is three tenses of the verb “to be” all combined in One. Hayah, Hoveh and Yiyeh. And I unite My Covenant Name with magnificent promises of what I do for My Covenant people as their benefits—The LORD your healer, the LORD your righteousness, the LORD your helper, the LORD who looks ahead and provides, the LORD your refuge, the LORD your fortress, the LORD your redeemer, the LORD who sanctifies you, the LORD is peace, the LORD of hosts, and there are more. But that will tell you a lot about who I am to you. I AM always with you, whether to look after your past and give you beauty for your ashes, or to look after your present to turn it into a Garden of Eden, or to look after your future to make it one of shalom and not evil, a future and a hope—you beautiful inheritance.
I also state who I am as the LORD God, that is, Yahweh Elohim. My Covenant Name combined with the Name of God as the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Your creator and the creator of the universe. Elohim.
Next, I state the qualities of My divine nature, of which I have made you partakers: compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth. If you imitate Me as My dear children and walk in love, this should describe you as well. In fact, I pour My love into your heart through the gift of My Holy Spirit that I have given you who are in Christ Jesus as your Lord.
I am compassionate. I understand how you are formed and I know how you have fallen into the weakness of your flesh, corrupted by the seed of the devil’s lies to which Adam submitted and never repented. I sent Jesus who was tempted in every way you are and yet never sinned. In Him you find My compassion reaction, not to condemn but to save, to give you again the eternal life I promised you from the creation of the world.
I am gracious. I give you favor and grace. Grace is My life poured into you as a branch attached to the vine so you bear much fruit. I give you everything and make you partakers of My divine nature by My Word.
I am slow to anger. I have an infinitely long fuse, but My anger can be aroused to work justice on those who destroy My Covenant people. I know hearts and a humble, contrite heart I will not spurn but will mend.
I abound in lovingkindness and truth. Chesed ve emet. You will see this as a recurring theme in the Old Testament identifying who I am. Chesed is agape love, it is unconditional everlasting love that never fails, never gives up, and never quits calling you to Me. It is laying down your life for your friends.
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.
And I am truth. My Word is truth. And the word “truth” in Hebrew is “emet” which also means “faithful.” I AM the faithful and the true. Jesus is the faithful witness to you of My love and all My magnificent promises, guaranteed to those in Covenant with Me through making Covenant with Jesus, are “yes” to you in Him, for He is My great “amen” to you. And the word “emet” is the root of the word “amen” in Hebrew. And Jesus is My great “amen” to you and He is the offering of your “amen” (I believe and confirm my agreement to what you say as the truth) to Me.
And next I tell you that I am the One “who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.” Love is gentle and kind, slow to anger, and always believing the best, but love is also just and does not allow you to abuse yourself and others, to align yourself with the evil one and carry out his will in the earth, and to work injustice and lawlessness. I will draw this up before your eyes and do all I can to stop you from shipwrecking your life and the lives of others, especially your children and family, but I have given you dominion authority over your world and your own life so ultimately you decide the way you will go. However there is a cutoff point if you keep doing only evil, destroying yourself and others, indeed, My very earth, where you have gone your own way and I know you, like the devil you serve, will never repent and return to Me. And at that point you will cut yourself off from Me as Adam did and move to the outer darkness of the continuum of life, completely the opposite of My nature of love and light. At that point all I can say is “I never knew you, out of My sight you evildoers.” I forgive and forget as soon as you return to Me in repentance, and I continually knock at your door to enter and establish our fellowship again, like I did with Manasseh, 2 Chronicles 33:13, but if you shut Me out, I cannot violate the choice you have made. My Son tried everything with Herod to call him back from his folly but Herod would not. King Saul was the same, and though his son Jonathan loved Me and believed David was in the right, his loyalty stayed with his lawless father and it cost Jonathan the fullness of his life on earth. The iniquity of the father was shared by him because he would not cut off that relationship but stayed loyal to one who had turned against Me to the end. He knew his father was wrong but he stuck with him. Be careful about that.
There is so much more I want to share with you about walking in love that I will continue in our next Life Lesson, because love alone will win the throne.
I love you. Know that I am with you as your helper. I will help you to walk in love if you will let Me teach you how and equip you with all that you need to do so by My Spirit in you and on you. The life giving water Jesus offers you to drink is eternal life but it is also eternal love. Liquid love. There is no life without love.