The Doctrines of the New Church Briefly Explained/Chapter21
XXI.—What is it to Love God?
The Bible teaches that, to love God with all the heart, and the neighbor as one's self, is the sum and substance of all the divine precepts. For it says that, "on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." But the meaning of this precept, simple as it appears, was but dimly apprehended by Christians a hundred years ago. And not many, even at this day, seem to have any clear idea of what it is to love the Lord supremely. Few seem to understand that it is to love truth, sincerity, justice, benevolence—all those divine and heavenly principles which come from God, and which, when received by men, make them angels—images and likenesses of the Heavenly Father. Nor has it been, nor is it now, generally known that these divine principles are truly loved, only so far as they are carried into practice—ultimated in our daily lives—made governing principles of action in all our intercourse and transactions with our fellow-men. But the teachings of the New Church are explicit on this subject. Let two or three passages from the Writings suffice for illustration:
"So far as a man shuns and is averse to unlawful gains acquired by fraud and craft, he wills what is sincere, right and just; and at length he begins to love what is sincere because it is sincere, what is right because it is right, and what is just because it is just, for the reason that they are from the Lord and the love of the Lord is in them. For to love the Lord is not to love his person, but it is to love those things which proceed from Him, for these are the Lord with man; thus it is to love what is itself sincere, what is itself right, what is itself just; and since these things are the Lord, therefore in proportion as a man loves them and acts from them, he acts from the Lord; and in the same proportion the Lord removes things insincere and unjust, even as to the intentions and will wherein they have their roots." (Ap. Ex. n. 973.)
"By loving the Lord is not meant to love Him as a person, but it is to love the divine good and truth which are the Lord in heaven and in the church. And these two principles are not loved by knowing them, thinking them, understanding them and speaking them, but by willing and doing them." (Ap. Ex. n. 1099.)
"He who thinks that he loves the Lord when he does not live according to his precepts, is greatly deceived; for to live according to his precepts, is to love Him. These precepts are the truths which are from the Lord, and He is in them; therefore so far as these are loved, that is, so far as the life is formed according to them from love, so far the Lord is loved. The reason is, that the Lord loves man, and from love wills that he may be happy to eternity; and man cannot be made happy except by a life according to his precepts. . . . The Lord also teaches in John: 'He that hath my precepts and doeth them, he it is that loveth me.' 'He that loveth me not, keepeth not my sayings,' xiv. 21-24." (A. C. 10,579.)