Pursue Perfect Love that Casts Out Fear 1 John 4 18

1 John 4:18
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

Everyone has hurts and pains received from other people that they have a hard time forgiving and forgetting. They may try to let their love extend to that person but it just doesn’t seem to work. In some cases hate takes over and there is no love or forgiveness to fix the situation. Whatever the circumstance is, that caused the problem, the outcome has to do with punishment, and most of the ongoing punishment goes to the person who is upset about what happened to them. They are angry about the injustice another person has done to them and the anger actually stems from fear that it might happen again. This fear causes them to build up a wall of self-defense to keep that from happening again and everything that reminds them of that situation brings back the hurtful experience. Each person with these type hurts can’t figure out how to fix it with their love. What is needed is perfect love that drives out this fear and it only comes through Jesus from God who sheds His love widely into our heart as we go to Him in faith asking for the solution (Romans 5:5).

How to Activate Perfect Love

Romans 5:5
And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

When we are trying to fix the situation with our imperfect love, so that we can stop hurting, we are not relying on God’s perfect love to make the repair. We have to go to God and ask Him to give us His love to make the repair. He then pours this love into our hearts through Jesus. As we seek God for the answer He manifests His presence and gives us His peace that passes all understanding, and what was impossible with man becomes possible with God (Philippians 4:7, Luke 18:27).

 Perfect Love Works by the Holy Spirit

When we ask God for His perfect love, to cast out this fear in our lives, we have to believe that God will give it to us. If we ask God for bread would He give us a stone? Or if we asked God for a fish would he give us a serpent? Much more if we ask Him for something He has already promised through the Holy Spirit in Romans 5:5, He will give us His perfect Love, filling us with His Love by the Holy Spirit (Luke 11:11-13).

Beloved, don’t go another day living in the pain of memories, which only hurt you and not the one who caused the pain. Ask God for His perfect love to cast this fear out of your life and receive His solution in the name of Jesus via the Holy Spirit (John 16:23).

Additional Links:
http://biblehub.com/john/16-23.htm
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2011:11-13
http://biblehub.com/luke/18-27.htm
http://biblehub.com/philippians/4-7.htm
http://biblehub.com/romans/5-5.htm