Abide in Love to have God’s Love Perfected in us and Love others with God as Love

The secret of how to stand boldly before the judgment seat of Christ is to abide in love, that is, live a life in which we love Christ and love others habitually with the love that is God Himself so that He may be expressed through us; perfect love is the love that has been perfected in us by our loving others with the love of God.

Oh Lord Jesus, we want to learn the secret of how to stand boldly before the judgment seat of Christ! Amen, Lord, we want to abide in love! Keep us abiding in You in all things. May we live a life in which we love Christ and we love one another with the love which is Christ Himself. May we love You and love others habitually with the love that is God Himself so that God may be expressed in us! Amen!

May we be before the Lord, regarding us being perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect. How can we be perfect?

It is not by perfecting ourselves or trying to be better; it is by realising that we are children of our heavenly Father, who is perfect in love. His divine life is in us, and we are being perfected in His love.

When we live by the divine life, we will be perfected in His love, and we will be perfect as God is perfect.

We will be constituted with Christ, for the all-inclusive Christ is wrought into us to be our everything for the one new man, which is being perfected and renewed.

We as kingdom people need to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect; in particular, this means that we need to be perfect in God’s love.

The divine love is the nature of God’s essence, for God is love. God is love, He loves us, and He is rich in mercy because of His great love toward us.

He loved us and He poured out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

The very essence of God, God as love, has been dispensed into us. Now we take this most excellent way in the church life – the way of love.

God loved us, and He infused us with His love; He generated within us the love with which we love God and love others.

As children of God who have His life and nature, we grow in life, we live by the divine life, and we are perfected in His love.

Even more, we become love itself. We love the Lord and we love one another with God as love being dispensed into us and flowing out of us.

His love floods us, carries us away, being like a rushing tide of great waters toward us, to impel us to live to the Lord beyond our own control. Amen!

Abide in Love to Abide in God and have Boldness in the day of the Judgment

First John chapter four tells us the secret of how to stand boldly before the judgment seat of Christ: abide in love to abide in God (v. 17).

He who abides in love abides in God and God abides in him. What does it mean for us to abide in love?

It means not only that we love God and love others, but that we love others habitually.

We love others not with our own love but with the love that is God Himself, for when we abide in love, we abide in God.

God is love. When we abide in God, we abide in love (v. 16). John uses abiding in God and abiding in love interchangeably, and in particular, he speaks of abiding in love to abide in God. Wow!

We need to abide in love. We do this by remaining in our spirit, for our spirit is a spirit of love.

When we exercise our spirit and fan our spirit into flame, we will abide in love, for God is love, and God as love is in our spirit.

To abide in love is to live a life in which we love others habitually; we don’t love them only sometimes or when they are lovable, but habitually, and our love is not our own, but God Himself as love in us.

God abides in us to be our life inwardly; He is our life in our spirit, always abiding in us, and He is also our living outwardly.

In this way, He can be one with us in a practical way. Thank the Lord that there is an organic union between God and us!

We are one with Him, and we are even in Him. We are in God, and God is in us.

In 1 John 4:16, the apostle John doesn’t say that if we abide in God, we abide in love; rather, he said that, if we abide in love, we abide in God. Wow, God is love, and when we abide in love, we abide in God!

This means that love is God and God is love. We should not try harder to love others, trying our best to have love toward them.

Rather, we should simply abide in love so that we may abide in God, and we will love others with God as our love.

When we abide in love, we abide in God, and in this has love been perfected in us, that we may have boldness in the day of the judgment, because even as He is, so also are we in this world.

Even as Christ is, so are we in this world. When we abide in love, the love of God is perfected in us.

This means that the love of God is perfectly manifested in us, and we have boldness without fear (v. 18). Wow, we can have boldness without fear, and we can stand boldly before the judgment seat of Christ by abiding in love, for God is love!

When we exercise our spirit to love the Lord and love one another, the love of God is perfected in us.

This means that the love of God is completed, accomplished, and finished in us. God is love, and the love of God is perfect and complete in Himself; however, the love of God needs to be perfected in us. We need to experience the love of God.

God wants us to abide in love so that we may experience His love, thus being perfected in love.

The more we enjoy God as love, the more we abide in love and thus experience the love of God, the more we are perfected in love.

If the love of God is perfected in us, we have boldness in the day of judgment. Wow, we have boldness in the day of judgment if today we abide in God as love!

This boldness is boldness of speech, confidence; we have confidence in the day of judgment, for we today abide in love.

When we face the judgment at the judgment seat of Christ (2 Cor. 5:10) at His coming back (1 Cor. 3:13; 4:5; 2 Tim. 4:8), we have boldness before God if we abide in love.

May we choose to abide in love today. The judgment at the judgment seat of Christ will be not for eternal perdition or salvation but for reward or punishment.

If we today love the brothers with God as love, thus abiding in love, we will have boldness on that day, on the day of judgment.

We will be like Christ in this world; He lived a life of love, He loved with God as love, and He remained in the love of God, so He was one with God in all things.

We need to live the same life as the Lord Jesus did today by abiding in love. May we abide in the Lord as love.

May we live the same kind of life that He lived, not by trying harder to copy or imitate Him outwardly, but by loving the Lord and loving the brothers with God as love, even as we abide in love.

If we today love the brothers with God as love as a result of our abiding in love, we will have boldness in the day when Christ judges His believers at His judgment seat.

May we pray this matter before the Lord, opening to Him and asking Him to give us the experiences we need for us to enter into this reality today.

May we be those who love others habitually with God Himself as love so that He may be expressed through us.

Lord Jesus, may we see the secret of how to stand boldly before the judgment seat of Christ. Amen, Lord, may we abide in love so that we may abide in God! We exercise our spirit today to abide in God, for God abides in us. Oh Lord, keep us in the organic union with You today. Keep us in our mingled spirit. May we abide in the love that is God Himself so that we abide in God and God abides in us! Hallelujah, when we abide in love, the love of God is perfected in us. Amen, Lord, may Your love be perfectly manifested in us so that we may have boldness without fear in the day of judgment. Lord Jesus, we love You. We open to You. Keep us abiding in love so that we abide in God. May we abide in love and love the brothers with God as our love. May Your love be perfected in us. May we experience Your love, not only enjoying Your love but even more, flowing out Your love to others. Praise the Lord, if we love the brothers with God as love, we will have boldness in the day when Christ judges His believers at His judgment seat! Hallelujah!

Perfect Love is the Love that has been Perfected in us by our Loving Others with the Love of God

God is love. He simply is love. When we touch God, when we see God, and when God reaches to us, we touch His love. He loves us so much, for He Himself is love. He is perfect love. When we love God, we cannot but love all men.

When we abide in God, we abide in love, and when we abide in love, we abide in God. In God, love is perfect, for God is love. But God wants us to enjoy and experience Him as love today, even to have His love perfected in us.

He poured out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, and now we are being perfected in His love.

As we live our Christian life, we are learning to abide in the Lord; we are in an organic union with Him, and we abide in the Lord by abiding in His love.

Oh, the Lord is so full of love! When we touch and enjoy His love, we abide in love, and we abide in God.

In this love, in the love of God being perfected in us, there is no fear. Where there is fear, there is no love. But where there is love, there is no fear!

This fear refers not to the fear that we will offend God and be judged by Him (1 Pet. 1:17; Heb. 12:28) but to the fear that we have offended God and will be judged by Him.

When we abide in love, we have no fear that we have offended God and that we will be judged by Him, for we abide in God, and God is love.

This is perfect love. Perfect love is not just the love of God; perfect loves is the love that has been perfected in us by our loving others with the love of God.

When we abide in love and therefore love others with the love of God, we have no fear, for we love God and we abide in His love.

It is so good to be here, in God as love, abiding in love and therefore abiding in God! Such love casts out fear and has no fear of being punished by the Lord (see Luke 12:46-47). May we be those who are open to the Lord for His love to be perfected in us.

May we be perfected in God as love today. He who fears has not been perfected in love (1 John 4:18). This means that, if we fear being judged by God, we have not lived in the love of God so that it could be perfectly manifested in us. Oh Lord Jesus!

May we allow the love of God to be perfected in us (1 John 4:12, 17). May we be perfected in the love of God (v. 18).

On the one hand, the love of God is perfected in us. On the other hand, we are being perfected in the love of God.

This means that we and the divine love are mingled; love becomes us and we become love. This is the divine love being perfected in us and we being perfected in the divine love. Wow!

The Lord Jesus said in Matt. 5:48 that we shall be perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect; this means that we will be perfect in His love.

When we abide in love and God abides in us, we are being perfected in the love of God and the love of God is being perfected in us.

The result is that the love becomes us and we become the love. May we love one another, because love is of God, and everyone who loves has been begotten of God and knows God (1 John 4:7).

He who does not love, does not know God, because God is love. If God has loved us so much, we ought also to love one another.

We know we have believed the love which God has in us (v. 16).

God’s love was manifested to us in God’s sending of His Son to be both a propitiatory sacrifice and life to us (1 John 4:9-10).

Yet if we don’t love one another with God as love as it was manifested to us, that is, if we don’t express it by loving one another with the love with which God loved us, it is not manifested perfectly and completely.

May our living express God as love by our abiding in love so that we may love others with God as love.

Lord Jesus, we want to abide in love and love others with God as love. May the love of God be perfected in us and may we be perfected in love. Thank You, Lord, for manifesting Your love toward us by sending Christ to be our propitiatory sacrifice and our life. May we enjoy Your love, know Your love, and abide in Your love. May we love one another with God as love so that the love of God may be manifested in us. May the love of God be perfected and completed in its manifestation when we express it in our living by habitually loving one another with God as love. Praise the Lord, our living in which we love one another in the love of God is the perfection and completion of this love in its manifestation to us! Hallelujah, perfect love has no fear in it! Amen, Lord, may love be perfected in us by our loving others with the love of God! Keep us abiding in Your love so that we may love the brothers and even love all men with God as love! Amen!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers on this topic, and portions from, Life-study of 1 John, msg. 35, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crucial Aspects of Matthew 5 through 7 (2025 September ITERO), week 6, Being Perfect as Our Heavenly Father Is Perfect – day 6.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Abide in Thee! in that deep love of Thine, / My Jesus, Lord, Thou Lamb of God divine, / Down, closely down, as living branch with tree, / I would abide, my Lord, my Christ, in Thee. / Abide in Thee! my Savior God, I know / How love of Thine so vast in me may flow, / My empty vessel, running o’er with joy, / Must overflow to Thee without alloy. (Hymns #563 stanzas 1-2)
  – Thou gavest Thy beloved Son / In love to come and die, / That we may be Thy many sons, / As heirs with Him, made nigh. / Through Him we have Thy very life / And Thou our Father art; / Thy very nature, all Thyself, / Thou dost to us impart. (Hymns #30 stanzas 3-4)
  – Now in all the churches flowing, / Brotherly love. / Light and life and love bestowing, / Brotherly love. / In the oneness all believing, / Fellowship with all receiving, / Nevermore the Spirit grieving, / Brotherly love. / To maintain the sweet communion, / Brotherly love; / Fellowship and healing union, / Brotherly love. / Love believing for the brothers, / Hoping all things for the others, / Suffering all with one another, / Brotherly love. (Hymns #1277 stanzas 1-2)