We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.
I John iii. 14.

For who has aught to love and loves aright,
Will never in the darkest strait despair,
For out of love exhales a living light,
The light of love, that spends itself in prayer.
Hartley Coleridge.

LOVE is life, and lovelessness is death. As the grace of God changes a man’s heart and cleanses and sanctifies him, this is the great evidence of the change, this is the great difference which it makes; that he begins to grow in love, to lay aside self-seeking, and to live for others — and so he may know that he has passed from death unto life. He may know it even here and now — yes, that great discovery of love, that learning to live for others and finding the grace and gentleness that God is keeping up all over the world — even now it is the way from death to life. Even now it changes homes, it lightens every burden, it brings peace and gladness into the hardest days; it alters even the tone of a man’s voice and the very look of his face. But all this, blessed and surpassing as it is, far above all else in the world, still is but the beginning. For that life into which we pass, as God’s dear grace of love comes in us and about us, is the very life of heaven.
Francis Paget.