When I was finishing seminary I was frustrated because I still didn’t know what the real purpose of the Christian life was, other than to become like Christ, which seemed vague. Fortunately, by reading the great Christian spiritual life teachers of the past, I discovered in scripture God’s desire for the Christian life.
The goal or purpose of the Christian life can be stated several different ways. Our goal is to become Christ-like. Our goal is the restoration of God’s image in us. Our goal is to become a perfect community of believers. Our goal is to become one with God. Our purpose is to live a “Kingdom of God” life. Our purpose is to glorify God. At the root, these are all different ways of saying that the Christian life is centered on one thing: God’s love.
Jesus’ teachings all flow from God’s true and good nature. His teachings are not just a list of random commands God gave to us to see if we would be obedient. Rather, His teachings flow from God’s love, and the gospel is the epitome of His love. So every element of the gospel is best understood in the context of His desire to be in a strong and loving relationship with us and for us to live in community with fellow believers. He wants to be our Father, our teacher, our lover, and our friend.
Jesus summed this up in Matthew 22:37 by saying that the greatest commandment was to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. Then He said that a second similar commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself (Love, or friendship, can be defined as a commitment to the well-being of another, often accompanied with affection.).
A few years later the Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the church in Galatia and stated: “For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (NLT) Gal 5:14. He wasn’t referring to the old covenant but rather was teaching the believers how to treat each other. He surprisingly omitted the first “greatest commandment” Jesus stated and just stated the second. This emphasizes how important it is for believers to love one another. Nothing comes before this, except our love for God – which is demonstrated by loving fellow believers.
Paul emphasizes brotherly love again in I Corinthians 13, the famous passage on love. In this passage Paul is again teaching the believers how to treat each other and making it clear that love is superior to supernatural powers and gifts. People are easily impressed by the supernatural – as we should be, but loving fellow believers is even more important and more valuable to God. At the end he states: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” I Corinthians 13:13 (NIV).
The Apostle John sums up Jesus’ commandments by saying: “And this is His commandment: We must believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us.” (I John 3:23, NLT) Thus, when it comes to our actions, loving one another is the highest priority. All the other good things such as preaching, study of scripture, worship, missions, etc., follow after.
All Christian doctrine serves to establish love and relationship as the center of reality and existence. All our evangelism and study and worship and meetings are supposed to lead to the community of love with God and His followers.
In a famous statement The Shorter Catechism of the Westminster Confession teaches that “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” If Jesus said loving God and others are the greatest commandments then perhaps the highest “chief end of man” is to love God and others. Many things glorify God but the highest way is to love. It would be a good devotional just to reflect on the chief end of people by meditating on the scriptures presented below.
It is the goodness and love of God that make Jesus’ teachings rise above all else. His resurrection is not good unless He is good and unless the Father is good. If God is not loving and merciful then what good would it do us for Jesus to rise from the dead? When we present the faith to others, or to ourselves, love should be the center because that is what Jesus and His Apostles taught. If love/friendship is missing from the center of my theology or tradition then it needs to change. The Apostle Paul said that if I have all knowledge but don’t have love then “I am nothing” (I Corinthians 13:2).
Scripture
Matthew 22:34-40 (NLT) “But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees with His reply, they met together to question Him again. One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap Him with this question: “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the Law of Moses?”
“Jesus replied, ‘You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
Galatians 5:13-15 (NLT) “For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ But if you are always biting and devouring one another, watch out! Beware of destroying one another.”
Colossians 3:10 (NIV) “[You] have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.”
I John 3: 18-24 (NLT) “Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God. Even if we feel guilty, God is greater than our feelings, and He knows everything. Dear friends, if we don’t feel guilty, we can come to God with bold confidence. And we will receive from Him whatever we ask because we obey Him and do the things that please Him. And this is His commandment: We must believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us. Those who obey God’s commandments remain in fellowship with Him, and He with them. And we know He lives in us because the Spirit He gave us lives in us.”
I Corinthians 13:2 (NASB) “If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”
For a more thorough discussion of the story of humanity and where believers fit into it, see our article “A Biblical Theology of Maturity” (about 8 pp.) which explains God’s purpose for our lives.