In Yoke

He that loveth not, knoweth not God, for God is love.   –  I John These words sound so ethereal that most of us cannot connect them with daily life.  What, we ask, do personal relationships have to do with the divine? I would reply that it is by discovering the unity between ourselves and others – all others – that we find our unity with God.  Jesus taught unity, not a cosmos of dualism. We don’t first get to know God and then, by some miracle of grace, come to love our fellow human beings.  Loving others comes first. In this sense, learning to love is practicing religion. Those who can put the welfare of others before their own small personal interests are religious, even if they would deny it.  This posture is possible only through what the scriptures refer to as "faith". This is the only route to life in the Kingdom, Jesus' code word for walking with him in the Spirit, being "born again" or "born from above". It requires a gaze on Christ