"God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them . . . There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love."
1 John 4:16-18
As to what love is, Paul beautifully described the qualities of love at 1 Corinthians 13:4-7. For those of you unfamiliar with Paul, I have put his words in bold letters and added contemporary commentary.
Love is patient;
"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war."
Ann Coulter
"You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists, and this and that and the other thing. Nonsense! I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist."
Pat Robertson
love is not envious
"I'm an old-fashioned woman. Men should take care of women, and if men were taking care of women today, we wouldn't have to vote."
Kay O'Connor (Kansas Senate Republican)
or boastful
"Our culture is superior. Our culture is superior because our religion is Christianity..."
Pat Buchanan
or arrogant
"They would have us believe that Islam is just as good as Christianity. Christianity was founded by the virgin-born son of God, Jesus Christ. Islam was founded by Muhammad, a demon-possessed pedophile who had 12 wives, the last one of which was a nine-year-old girl."
Jerry Vines (Southern Baptist Convention)
or rude.
"I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good...Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism."
Randall Terry
It does not insist on its own way;
"We are to make Bible-obeying disciples of anybody that gets in our way."
Jay Grimstead (Coalition on Revival)
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