I am memorizing the book of 1st John in the New Testament. There are five chapters with 105 verses. My goal is to memorize three verses each week and to get it done in eight months. It is a difficult book to memorize. The main theme of the book is “don’t sin.” At the very beginning John says, “I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.” But the only commandment he mentions is love one another and the only sin he mentions is hating others, and he mentions them often. John says, “if you hate your brother you are walking in the darkness and you don’t know where you are going because the darkness has blinded your eyes.” John says there are only two commandments, believe in Jesus and love one another. Pretty simple list of commandments. John says that we can love others because He first loved us. The more we think about, and meditate on how much He loved us, the easier it is to love others. Those who hate others have not really comprehended how much Jesus loves them. 

The most basic ingredient in loving others is to forgive them of anything just as God has forgiven us. To love others is to honor them, to be nice to them. To love others is to help them when they need help, to meet needs that we can meet. We know what it means to love another person, we don’’t really need to be taught, but often bitterness and resentment has blinded our eyes, and we are walking in the darkness just like John says.