,
may be full. (John 15:11) It’s all
about joy. The Lord’s laws are all
about joy.
The connection between
laws and love is difficult to see
in our world today when we
tend to emphasize one or the
other and not truly bring them
together. We can see it in the
Palm Sunday story when the
people are looking for an earthly
kind of leadership, with earthly
kinds of laws and an earthly
kind of king. They are not able
to see what the Lord is really
leading to. It is not even until
Easter morning when they
start to see that the Lord was
talking about something way
bigger, way deeper, way more
important than simply taking
over Jerusalem. He is talking about laws of the universe! These are the laws
that exist within us. These are the laws of love come alive.
So the Lord does make laws and He has all the power to enforce them. He
has the power to do whatever He wants. And the wonderful thing is, His power
again is all about love. Everything the Lord does is for love, so He would never
abuse His power. He would never act like an earthly king might and exercise
His power in dictatorial ways. His laws are truly about making love come alive
for people.
One of His laws is that our free will must be preserved. We will never be
forced to love what the Lord wants us to love. We will never be forced to love
at all. The Lord’s laws are all about leaving us in free will. Again, this is not
about an earthly king with earthly laws and earthly exercise of power. This is
way beyond that. This is about the rulership of our spirit, about what goes on
within us. It is about laws that bring out love. It is about laws that