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The Light
Dr David Wood
THE LIGHT
EIGHT SPIRITUAL LAWS
LOVE – FIRST AND FOUNDATIONAL SPIRITUAL LAW
Greetings in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ! 2009 is spent and
2010 is before us. I am convinced that this year is going to be a wonderful
year of awakening, growth and victory for the Church. The world, the Babylonian
system is in a mess. Our government is so corrupt and confused they think they
can save the nation by taking everything over and borrowing money. It seems to
me that anyone with just a little education could figure out this is not right
and will not work. Of course, we in the Church (ekklesia) understand that this
is an ongoing attack of demonic forces to destroy America. Why? For one that
is what he does (John 10:10) and second this is a covenant nation with God. I
believe the rain (latter rain) for the last and greatest awakening is beginning
in the land. Unfortunately there are vast numbers of Christians still fast
asleep for their leadership is asleep. It seems to me that the unsaved and
those Christians outside the “mainstream” Church are awakening most rapidly.
There is going to be an awakening, a restoration of Eden in the earth. God will
have a people, the question is, are you one of those people? This year, 2010, I
will be dealing with eight Spiritual Laws. So let’s get started.
Seven spiritual laws were established before the fall of man in Genesis 3:6 and
the eighth was established soon after the fall. Seven is the number of
spiritual perfection or completeness so it is not surprising that God gave seven
Spiritual Laws in the creation. God placed these in operation before the fall
of man. The eighth Spiritual Law was instituted soon after the fall of man.
These Eight Spiritual Laws are a mechanism that allows us to operate as God
operates. These mechanisms are in place today and are foundational to our walk
in Christ Jesus. An excellent source of Biblical numerology is a book entitled
Biblical Mathematics Keys to Scriptural Numerics by Evangelist Ed. F. Vallowe.
As I launch into the origins of these laws you will soon recognize that the full
counsel of Scripture is required to recognize and define these laws. Spiritual
Laws like natural laws have a predictable consequence every time they are
activated. If you jump off the roof you will go to the ground 100% of the
time. When you properly activate a Spiritual Law you will get the results of
that law 100% of the time as well. We can see the first three spiritual laws in
Genesis 1:1-3. Those are love, faith, and words. For this January installment
of The Light I will now launch into a discussion of the first and foundational
Spiritual Law, love.
Genesis 1:1 (KJV)
1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
The phrase, “In the beginning” is a Hebrew word
meaning the first thing, first in place or the principal thing. So the first
thing God did was create the heaven and the earth. Now that should not be taken
to mean that the first thing He did ever was to create the heaven and the earth
but that relative to us this is the first thing He did. The word God is a
Hebrew word, Elohim, a pleural word for God meaning Father, Son and Holy
Spirit. The word heaven is also pleural indicating the creation of this
atmospheric envelope about the earth and what we call outer space.
The disciple whom Jesus loved tells us that God is love.
“1 John 4:8
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”
“1 John 4:16
And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love;
and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.”
Notice that God does not just have, give or show love but He is Love! The
Spiritual Law of love was established immediately at the creation. Love (the
person, the way of thinking and the acts) are very apparent in the first
thirty-nine books of our Covenant but are amplified in the next twenty-seven
books of our Covenant. People may make arguments concerning these Spiritual
laws like which is first or which is most important but you will quickly see
that these laws work together like the parts of our human body.
This word love is the Greek word, agape, translated in the King James Version of
the Bible as charity. This word charity transmits a fair facsimile of the true
meaning. Most of us look at charity as the giving of something to benefit
another with no expectation of the one receiving. I have been led of the Spirit
to define the word agape as follows: agape is a deep and constant interest in a
person, it is a function of the will, it is right or righteous, it reflects
covenant (blood), and it is not dependent on the recipient in any way. It is
solely dependent on the giver.
I made the point above that God (Elohim - God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Spirit) does not only have love and do acts of love but He is love.
You can not separate Him from love anymore than you can say that your arm is not
part of your physical body. So, since we are children of God we have the same
spiritual organs that our Father has just as your physical children have all the
same physical organs you have. One of those is love. The fruit of that organ
or the expression of that organ are acts, attitudes, thoughts and words of
love. The fruit of an apple tree is apples. The fruit of our spiritual organ
of love bears the fruit of love.
Just as you can not separate God and love, you can not separate a born again man
from love. If the spiritual organ of love were removed you would no longer be
like God, therefore God would not be your father and you would not be a born
again man. Many think that the opposite of love is hate but in reality it is
fear (1 John 4:18). Fear elicits hate. The love is felt strongly at salvation
and our love is expressed freely but over time it may cool if we are not
diligent to exercise and mature our love walk. There are nine spiritual fruit
or organs named in Scripture.
“Galatians 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering,
gentleness, goodness, faith, [23] Meekness, temperance: against such there is no
law.”
Fruit is something that is produced or it is the effect or consequence of
something or someone. I suggest that work and fruit are related. Notice in
Galatians 5:19 it says, “the works of the flesh” and in the 22nd
verse, “the fruits of the spirit”. It does not change the meaning of these
verses if you interchange the words. God is love and so are we. When Elohim
breathed the breath of life into man, love was as much a part of man as it was
of God the Father. When we are born again in the new birth it (love) is
restored as at the first. We are a three part being (1 Thessalonians 5:23),
spirit, soul (mind, will and emotions) and body. When we are born again, once
again God breaths the breath of eternal life into us and we become a living soul
(soul & spirit). We are alive, one with God, and we produce the same fruit.
We have the very same nature as God, again in the image and likeness of God.
God reproduced himself in man kind, so we see in the beginning that God who is
love made children who are love.
Now I want to deal with a different aspect of love.
Romans 5:5
And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our
hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.”
God has shed his very love into our hearts. This word hearts, is not speaking
of our spirit, it is speaking of our soul which is our mind, our will and our
emotions. Our mind, our will and our emotions are to be conformed to the
definition of love. This is an experience of Gods love and an understanding of
God, of Gods love that transforms our mind. The greater our understandings of
Gods love the more we trust Him. The more we trust Him the more we will act
upon His Word. This leads us to exercise faith and faith is the victory that
overcomes the world (1 John 5:4). This is not our spiritual organ of love or
our fruit of love which this organ produces but it does lead us to maturity in
love.
Now, how does love act?
1 Cor. 13:4-8 NIV
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is
not proud. [5] It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs. [6] Love does not delight in evil but rejoices
with the truth. [7] It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always
perseveres.
[8] Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where
there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass
away.
Jesus brings the spiritual law of love into clear focus in the New Testament.
Let us look at Matthew’s Gospel;
“Matthew 22:35-40
Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a
question, tempting him, and saying, [36] Master, which is the great commandment
in the law? [37] Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and
with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
[38] This is the first and great commandment.
[39] And the second is like unto it,
Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. [40]
On these two commandments hang all the law and
the prophets.”
This passage and the passages that tell us that faith is powered by love
(Galatians 5:6), faith is what pleases God (Hebrews 11:6) and faith is the
victory over all the ways of the world (1 John 5:4) is what leads me to place
love as the first Spiritual Law. Without love operational in your life nothing
else will work. You will not have quality irreversible victory in your life.
Thank you Jesus for paying the price so that I can be one again and I can be one
with you again and walk in love!
In closing I want to bring into your thinking a higher level of love even than
that expressed in Matthew 22:35-40.
John 13:34-35
A new commandment I
give unto you, That ye love one another;
as I have loved you, that ye also love one
another. [35] By
this shall all men know that ye are my disciples,
if ye have love one to another.”
Notice, Jesus did not say to love one another as you love yourself but as He
loved us. Well how did He love us? He submitted His life to us! He laid aside
Heaven, and all that characterized Him as God and came as a man in the earth.
Not only that but He bore the shame of rejection and allowed the created to shed
the sinless blood and destroy the innocent body of the Creator. As the Gospel
song says: we owed a price we could not pay and he paid a price He did not owe.
That is our redemption (Galatians 2:20). He is saying, lay aside your plans and
be a servant to your fellow man. In so doing you will have a life far beyond
anything you can devise on your own. Love (God) is all about motive, HIS
motives. HIS primary motives are to add quality to the lives of people. When
we walk or live our lives in Biblical love we are an expression of God, an
expression of His heart. Love is not weakness but strength of the highest
order. In submission (we can only submit when we are free of fear [1 John
4:18]) we step into a place of God’s power without limit but in pride we are
food for the lions (1Peter 5:8).
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