Book Notes: "Jesus: Perfect Love"

In his thoughtful and detailed book, Jesus: Perfect Love, Lawrence Jakows outlines the numerous ways in which Jesus loves us.

We take for granted that Jesus loves us at times until we have a crisis of faith or just experience a difficult time in life. We feel abandoned by Our Lord and we forget that His love never waivers. This book is a catalog of Jesus’ love to us from Scripture to the saints.

As St. Bernard of Clairvaux states: “To know yourself is to fear God; to know Him is to love Him.” We begin to experience Jesus’ perfect love, by spending time in prayer and going to Mass, confession, and Adoration. All these things are detailed in the book.

Scripture is a good place to start in getting to know God. St. Augustine said that “the New Testament is hidden in the Old Testament and the Old Testament is revealed in in the New Testament.” Mother Angelica referred to good deeds, prayer, participating in the sacraments as deposits in a bank account to illustrate Matthew 6:20: “Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.”

Lawrence provides many experiences and quotes of the saints to illustrate Jesus’ Perfect Love. St. Teresa of Calcutta is probably the most recent and well-known saint to deliver that perfect love to the dying, starving and neglected. Our Lord told her, “They don’t know Me, so they don’t want Me.”

The Appendix offers prayers, promises, litanies, devotions and novenas for every season of the church, so wherever you begin your journey in learning about Jesus’ perfect love, there is a place where you can start.

Jesus: Perfect Love is not a quick read. It’s a book you leave nearby so that you can spend that time with Our Lord to get to know Him and see His Perfect Love in your life.

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