God Is Love - Context Is Key God Is Love - Context Is Key If we are to avoid misunderstanding John's statement that "God is love" - as some do - we must view it in conjunction with two other great statements of exactly similar grammatical form which we find elsewhere in his writings, both of them interestingly enough, deriving directly from Christ himself. These statements, "God is spirit" and "God is light", provide proper context for understanding that God is love. Christ's point in this statement is that while we, being flesh, can be present only one place at one time, God, being spirit, is not so limited. God has no body - therefore he is free of limitations of space and distance - and is omnipresent. God has no parts - meaning that his personality and powers and qualities are perfectly integrated, so that nothing in him ever alters. With him "there is no variation or shadow due to change" ( James 1:17). Thus he is free from all limitations of of time and natural processes, and he remains eternally the same. God has no passions - this does not mean that he is unfeeling (impassive) or that there is nothing in him that corresponds to emotions and affections in us, but that whereas human passions - especially the painful ones (fear, grief, regret, despair) are in a sense passive and involuntary, being called forth and constrained by circumstances not under our control, the corresponding attitudes in God have the nature of deliberate, voluntary choices, and therefore are not of the same order as human passion at all. So the love of the God who is spirit is no fitful, fluctuating thing, as human love is, nor is it a mere impotent longing for things that may never be; it is, rather, a spontaneous determination of God's whole being in an attitude of benevolence and benefaction, an attitude freely chosen and firmly fixed. There are no inconsistencies or vicissitudes in the love of the almighty God who is spirit. John made this statement against certain professing Christians who had lost touch with moral realities and were claiming nothing that they did was sin. The force of John's words is brought out by the clause after "God is light" - that being "and in him is no darkness at all." Light means holiness and purity, as measured by God's law; darkness means moral perversity and unrighteousness as measured by the same law ( 1 John 2:7-11, 1 John 3:10). John's point is that only those who "walk in the light," seeking to be like God in holiness and righteousness of life, and eschewing everything inconsistent with this, enjoy fellowship with the Father and Son; those who "walk in the darkness," whatever they may claim for themselves, are strangers to that relationship ( 1 John 1:6-7) So the God who is love is first and foremost light, and sentimental ideas of his love as an indulgent, benevolent softness, divorced from moral standards and concerns, must therefore be ruled out from the start. God's love is holy love. The God whom Jesus made known is not a God who is indifferent to moral distinctions, but a God who loves righteousness and hates iniquity, a God whose ideal for his children is that they should "be perfect...as you heavenly Father is perfect. ( Matthew 5:48). He will not take into his company any person, however orthodox in mind, who will not follow after holiness of life. Additionally, scripture does not allow us to suppose that because God is love we may look to him to confer happiness on people who will not seek holiness, or to shield his loved ones from trouble when he knows that they need trouble to further their sanctification. God is love, God is spirit, God is light.
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