I love big words. Epistemology is one of those words. It is the science of knowing. It is the study of how we can know what we know. It therefore studies reason, scientific method, intuition, "evolutionary memory", instinct and much more. In verse 12 Paul alludes to love as the most powerful way to know. We can call this an "epistemology of love". Love is a kind of knowing that includes, yet transcends, the rational. We think of knowledge as something to be "gained" and of course there is a very real sense in which it is. Yet love is self emptying. It gives itself away to another. And in the process it comes to know. In verse 12, I learn that I am know. How? By being loved, an "agape" love in the shape of a cross.
How then can I know another? By loving them, by carrying out the action, placing their welfare above mine, but investing my heart, ears, efforts, thoughts, sacrificially into the well-being of the other. In doing so I come to know them.
I wonder if any knowledge apart from love can be anything but data? Can anything be truly known without love?
After reading this, I am sitting here thinking of all the people I really "know". I know my kids, my husband, my parents, my grand mother, my best friend, other friends, etc. So I see what you are saying in this now. I also see where I need to change some too. The people I dont know I dont really love or try to love. But, I have been trying to see them through God's eyes and I guess a part of doing that is getting to know them. I like to think that every person in this world has at least one good characteristic that we could love, it just takes a lot of time and patience getting to know them and find that one thing sometimes!! Thanks Pastor for the daily reflections!!
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