Love Must be Paid in Kind

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon

1 Kings 3:3

And Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father: only he sacrificed and burnt incense in high places.

"As water is cast into a pump, when the springs lie low, to bring up more water, so God sheddeth abroad His love into our hearts, that our love may rise up to Him again by way of gratitude and recompense." How idle is it. then, to hope to chide ourselves into loving God! The price of love is love; the origin of it is not found in law or in a sense of duty, but in love, or a return of gratitude. When the sun of eternal love melts the glaciers of the soul, then the rivers of affection flow; but if the rocks of ice could all be broken to shivers with hammers, not a drop of affection would stream forth. Only a sense of Divine love will ever create love to God in the heart.

worlddic.com