I find it amazing that although the Bible says that love is greater than faith (1 Corinthians 13:13), it is faith through which a person becomes justified by God. Does it not seem strange that God does not look at how loving a person is in order to judge them as acceptable in his sight, but whether the person has faith? It is faith that makes the difference between eternal life and condemnation.
I have a couple thoughts on this. Faith is the one attribute that glorifies God in salvation instead of man. One truth that has helped me through the struggles with assurance of being accepted by God through my Christian life is that it is all about God's glory not mine. If God accepted me on the basis of how loving, righteous, holy, obedient, good, devoted I was, it would be to my glory. But God's purpose in salvation is to glorify his love, his mercy, his goodness, his righteousness. God doesn't save us because he is impressed with our goodness. He saves us so we can be impressed by his goodness.
If righteousness came by my goodness, then I would have to look to myself and have faith in myself. But faith through which we are justified looks at God's love and mercy and grace in Christ proclaimed in the message of the Bible and says I believe. It is an act of receiving a gift not of earning a reward. God wants to demonstrate His love to us in salvation.
Not that our love is not important. It is. But we don't have true spiritual love without faith. That kind of love comes with faith. We love because God first loved us. It is in comprehending the love of God through faith that we love back. He doesn't love us because we love him. We love him because he loves us.
How does he love us first? Well, while we were enemies and sinners, Christ died for us. And then he poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit that we could comprehend the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. The same Spirit that brings us to faith is the same Spirit that pours out God's love into our hearts.
The spiritually reborn believer has faith and love at the same time to some degree. They are inseparable. You can't believe but not love God. And you can't love God without faith. They both come from the same Spirit who raises spiritually dead sons of Adam to new life.
In the Christian life, the Spirit works through faith. Our hearts are filled with love by the Spirit to more we fix our minds on the love of God in Christ. So our faith works through love. The heart that loves God because God is lovely also inherently trusts in Him because, being Love, he is faithful and trustworthy.
I sure would not want my eternity based on how loving I was. For although the love of God is poured out in my heart through faith, I still have the stain of selfishness and unloving-ness in my character. When my heart convicts me, it is not through trying to be more loving that I achieve progress in the life of love we are called to. But it is in focusing my heart and mind of the love of Jesus that the power to love will come.
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