Love

Be on guard. Stand up for what you believe. Be strong. Be courageous. And everything you do must be done in love.
1Cor 6:13-14

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and Prophets hand on these two commandments.
Matt 22:37

My small group has spent some time discussing loving others. I know it's important because Jesus says all of the other laws hang on loving God and loving each other. But I guess the magnitude of it didn’t really occur to me until I read this:

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you...by this all men shall know that you are my disciples.
John 13:34-35

How does Christ love us?

Sacrificially.

With patience, kindness, contentment, humility, meekness, forgiveness, protection, trust, hope, rejoicing in the truth, with a serving heart and most of all with perseverance, -all those things in 1Cor 13.
We can basically recite that verse by heart after hearing it so many times at weddings. But can we honestly say we live it out? I know I can't.
Why not?
Too much of myself is still in the way.

But Christ Himself shows us why it's so important that we love others: So people will know that we are Christ's disciples. He reiterates this idea in Matt 7:20 "Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them."
It makes since that we are known by our fruit- (love in particular), not our gifts, because Satan can "disguise himself as an angle of light" 2 Cor11: 14. There are accounts of false prophets, false apostles, and people doing "miracles" but not with the power of Jesus. The gifts can be mimicked by Satan's powers so that for those without the Holy Spirit, it would be difficult to discern whether or not it was from Jesus.
But when they see us loving others as Jesus loved, then they know we are in Him.