The Law of Love - My Final for Philosophical Foundations for Ministry

In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote “I am cognizant of the inter-relatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”
King’s thoughts are the essence of what it means to live in community. When living in community together we understand that others exist and how they choose to live out their reality can affect our reality and vice versa. King’s plea was for justice throughout the community for all, not just a few, through equality and love. He argues “was not Jesus an extremist for love?” King was in a position in which he felt that Christian love had failed. He was left asking the question was not the law of love enough to provide justice and equality for a community? Should not the law of love be the basis for justice?
The law of love, presented by Christ’s love for humanity in His sacrifice, was supplied and given so humanity would learn to live their lives as a reflection of that love. This paper will first discuss how it is that Christians can live their lives as a reflection of Christ’s love through a movement towards Christ-likeness. We will then look at how our movement can be unrealized or even set aside causing injustice.
Being a Christian means that we have acknowledged and accepted Christ’s love sacrifice for our sins and salvation. Christ’s love can then be conveyed on our lives. John taught “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.” (1) Through Christ’s love we know what love is and that we are even able to truly love at all. It is Christ loving others through us, it is not of ourselves. Aristotle’s “view that existence is the movement from potential to actual” (2) (teleology) is a sound approach to form a foundation of Christ-likeness in ethical judgment. Moving towards something greater is a Christian principle. John explains, “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.” (3) Paul relates the same message in Philippians 3:12-14: “I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.”
The Christian walk is given its life and motivated by Christ’s love. It is a movement from what we are to what we will be in Christ. It is moving from potential to actuality in Christ. “Anything that facilitates this movement is good and anything that frustrates that movement is evil…For Christians the actual is Jesus. Hence, in this form of Christian ethics, the believer should act to facilitate the movement to Christ-likeness in oneself and in others.” (4)
Unfortunately, there is a certain reality that many Christians live today. That reality is one that is without an understanding of the purpose and potential that exists in their lives because of Christ’s sacrificial love. Paul explains in one of his letters that there “will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves…having a form of godliness but denying its power.” (5) When we don’t realize our purpose of becoming like Christ (holy, full of love and grace) it is impossible for us to love as Christ first loved us – sacrificially, unconditionally, etc. Our ethical judgment becomes skewed because we become as Paul reports: “lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient…ungrateful, unholy, without love.” (6) Without Christ’s love in us, we are left to injustice and evil become the norm.
If injustice and evil are everything that comes from the lack of Christ’s love, than equality and justice flow from the Law of love. They are a natural consequence of our movement towards Christ-likeness. Ultimate justice, the justice of God flows from His love. “The Almighty is beyond our reach and exalted in power; in his justice and great righteousness, he does not oppress.” (7) God’s justice is done in His righteousness and power. As Christians we should “try to be true to God’s idea of justice” (8) through living a holy life that has its foundation in Christ’s love.
Martin Luther King, Jr. beseeched his colleagues to comprehend his theology of the love of Christ. He implored them to discover the need to move towards Christ-likeness in our ethical judgments concerning equality and justice for all humanity. He asked should not the love of law be enough to provide this equality and justice. And he was right. The law of love as laid forth in Christ and provided only through Him is enough to provide equality and justice for all once we acknowledge that love and allow it to move us forward towards holiness, purity and Christ-likeness.

1. I John 3:16 (NIV)
2. Lecture, Section 3, Tuesday
3. I John 3:2-3 (NIV)
4. Lecture, Section 3, Tuesday
5. 2 Timothy 3:1-5
6. Ibid.
7. Job 37:23
8. John Grant, Critical response, 3/05/09, 12:44 pm.