I Corinthians 13:13
“And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three;
but the greatest of these is charity.”
Our emotions are very powerful. We see the evidence of how powerful the emotion of hate is almost every day and in most every part of our world. Every day we see on the news the destruction that hate causes in the lives of innocent people. Hate is at the root of most of the wars in our world and much of the evil in our society. Hate causes people to do the worst of atrocities against others. Mankind has done great evils against other humans in our world’s history based on hate they feel against the people they hurt. Hate is even powerfully destructive to ourselves as well. Many people hate themselves so much that they hurt themselves, deny themselves joy they could have, and even destroy themselves all of which is rooted in their hatred of themselves. In recent history, we have seen this mentality on a national level as an ineffective and problem causing reaction by the left to discriminations of the past that have been changed over time. You do not fix a problem by perpetuating the problem and manufacturing new problems. You actually fix problems by changing things in the root cause of the problem and making things the same for everyone. Hate is strong, to be sure, but the emotion of love can be even stronger. The hate that causes people to hurt others or even kill others can be overcome by the love shown in forgiveness. The hatred that causes some to hurt themselves can be overcome by seeing the value that God has placed on them by loving them and wanting them to enjoy His blessings in their life through His forgiveness of their sins. God does not want us to hate ourselves or others. God wants us to enjoy His love in our lives in order to love others with it for our benefit and theirs. Emotions are very powerful, but love is more powerful. Lives have been delivered from hate through the love that has been offered to them by God and other people in their life. God’s love caused a former Nazi prison guard to ask Corrie Ten Boom to forgive him for the evil he had done to her and her family. It was also love that allowed her to forgive this man who had been very evil to her and her family due to the hate he had been fed and brainwashed with as a young man. Love changed both of them in their attitudes towards each other. Many people today even hate God and His children, which causes them to do terrible things to themselves and others. And it is the love God offers to those very same people that can change their hate and make them a child of God if they would be willing to benefit from it. Hate is a powerful emotion. But the most powerful emotion that can change hate is love. And the most powerful love that anyone can experience to change their life or express to change the lives of others for good is God’s love.