The Aspostle Paul was a Great Lover

I'm reading a One Year chronological bible this year, so here at the end of the year I'm reading all of Paul's epistles. I've read them many times in my life, but I something different really stood out to me for the first time -- Paul really, really, really loves people.
You can see it throughout every letter. Paul's joy at the faith of the Philippians, his grief at the misunderstanding and misinformation of the Thessalonians and the Galatians. His desire that those who had fallen be restored. His letters are full of longing for his readers to really, truly grasp the love of Christ.

In Philippians 1:7 he tells them, "I have you in my heart." And when he speaks of Epaphroditus in Philippians 2, he says that God had mercy on Epaphroditus, healing him from a near-fatal illness, which Paul considered a mercy to himself as well, "to spare me sorrow upon sorrow."

Paul truly loves these people. It feels like a great big, "duh" in my head. Obviously he loves these people, he's risking his life for them most of the time. He's in chains for them. Gladly. Maybe I'm usually so focused on the "theology" and the "how do I apply this to my life" that I've missed it somehow. But then I'm reminded of Paul's conflict, "If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.  Convinced of this, I know that I will remain...." (Philippians 1:22-25)

Maybe Paul's great love is in part, because like the woman who anointed Jesus for His burial, Paul had been forgiven so much. His brothers and sisters in Christ, whom he had formerly been hunting and murdering, had forgiven him and embraced him. They had welcomed him (with some understandable hesitancy at first) into the family, into the Body of Christ.

It's funny, I always think of that as "He who is forgiven much, loves much." But that's not what Jesus said. He said, "whoever has been forgiven little loves little."

I know I've been forgiven more than a little. Much more. Really we all have. Even if you have been a "Christian" your entire life, you have been forgiven so much. It's easy to lose sight of that. It's easy to become prideful in our spiritual growth and maturity and forget how much we've been forgiven. We're even forgiven for that -- for that ugly, stinking, disgusting pride in ourselves for being "good Christians." 

Not one of us should be loving little. We should love big. Really big.

(Okay, not like the TV show Big Love, which I've never seen, but suddenly came to mind...I'm not advocating bigamy. Gross.)


For God so loved the world. He sent His only Son. Let us so love. Let us love one another so that's how people know we're Jesus disciples. (The church-at-large seems to be falling so short on that one.)  Let's turn the tide. Like the Apostle Paul, I want be a lover, a great one. How about you?