Love Is the Key

Have you ever worked on a project and gotten so fixated on one little problem that you forgot about the end goal? The early Christian church became so focused on protecting itself from error that it neglected what it was protecting: the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Besides the onslaught of deception, the early church had to also withstand the rise of persecution. Recall that the rest of Jesus’ apostles, with the exception of John, were martyred. In the first century, masses of Christians were slaughtered by Roman emperors Nero, in ad 67, and Domitian, in ad 81.

Subsequently, the church began to build a rigid coat of armor around the walls of its heart. As the last eyewitnesses of Christ’s life, death, and resurrection met their ends, the church lost sight of the very Rock upon which it had been built (Matthew 16:18), its “first love”—Jesus. The gospel is based upon the fact that “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19, emphasis added). If we overlook Christ’s sacrifice for us, that is when our love for Him dies. And without love for Christ, it is impossible for us to love one another. “For love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God” (v. 7).

The early church may at first have been resolute in doctrine, but when love and truth are separated, the gospel loses its power, and ritual takes the place of an earnest desire to seek and save the lost. It was due to the loss of this “first love” that formalism began to take hold. A system of truth became mere traditional forms, and the church began to crumble from the inside.

In Paul’s own letter to Ephesus, written around the year ad 62, we have a window into the issues that would eventually take hold of the church during the time John was writing Revelation. Paul admonished: “Speaking the truth in love, [we] may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ” (Ephesians 4:15).

Dearest Savior, help me to take the time each day to nurture my relationship with You, who loved me first.

For Further Study: Psalm 138:2; 1 Peter 1:18, 19; 1 John 1:1, 2; 4:9

Key Bible Texts

Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. (Revelation 2:4 KJV)