Spiritual Formation, Part III

(Lent is about humbling one's self and taking on the nature of Christ. Each Sunday during this time I will let wise Christians speak on these subjects, the first 3 weeks about self-renunciation and the following 3 weeks on spiritual formation. On this Palm Sunday we have the words once again of John Wesley.)


Palm Sunday (Sixth Sunday of Lent)

What is then the perfection of which man is capable while he dwells in a corruptible body? It is the complying with that kind command, "My son, give me thy heart." It is the "loving the Lord his God with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his mind." This is the sum of Christian perfection: It is all comprised in that one word, Love.

The first branch of it is the love of God: And as he that loves God loves his brother also, it is inseparably connected with the second: "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself:" Thou shalt love every man as thy own soul, as Christ loved us. "On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets:" These contain the whole of Christian perfection."

-- John Wesley, On Perfection