“Abide in my love” (Jn 15:9).
The love of our heavenly Father surrounds us, dwells in us and forms us into the image of Christ. Once we have come to know and accept it through faith, this love will always want to remain in us and will never leave us. It is divine love and therefore unchanging. It is a gift that we receive freely, but our task and our joy is to remain in it. And this is not difficult because God, for His part, never withdraws His love from us. Only we can turn away from it if we neglect to cultivate it and turn our love in a disorderly way towards the created, thus turning away from God.
If we cultivate love, it will grow. We can increase it every day, without ever ceasing, because as divine love it is infinite and we begin to share in it. Growth in love comes about in a special way when it becomes our criterion and we ask ourselves: Have I acted according to love? In other words: Is what I say and do in accordance with love? Have I remained in God’s love today, as Jesus exhorted His disciples to do?
If we choose love as the measure of all things, we will have gained a great light in our lives. Love will always challenge us and if we accept its challenge, it will fill us with deep joy. Love always moves us forward and wants to govern every situation in our lives. This applies to the big challenges as well as the small ones. Once love has reached a certain height by God’s grace, it will zealously strive to maintain it and remain at that level. Every small deviation hurts and becomes a thorn that moves it to return to the starting point and from there to move forward.
All this takes place in the serenity of the soul, for it enjoys deep peace when it has chosen love as its ruler. It knows that it is on the right path and in union with its Heavenly Father. It knows that it is the Father Himself who has pitched the Tent of Love within it, to spoil it with that love and at the same time to make it a vessel of His love. And the soul will want to remain with its Father both in time and in eternity.