Our Love of Christ: God's Righteous Requirement

"For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit."(Romans 8:3-5)

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

As it is written: 'For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for slaughter.' (Psalm 44:22)

Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, not any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:35-39)

God's love is steadfast toward believers. Paul was persuaded: nothing would be able to separate himself (or these) from their love of God in Christ Jesus. Yet distresses, famine, peril or sword, tribulation and persecution will come to test our love. "Who" is someone, or entity, that brings the trial. These will attempt to separate us from our love of Christ. Remember! It is our righteous requirement to walk according to, consistent with, the Spirit. We resist through faith, hope, love, patience and peace: steadfast in the faith.

Your Unbelief, from Here to There

"And when they had come to the multitude, a man came to Him, kneeling down to Him and saying, 'Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and suffers severely; for he often falls into the fire and often into the water. So I brought him to Your disciples, but they could not cure him.' Then Jesus answered and said, 'O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him here to Me.' And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him; and the child was cured that very hour."

"Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, 'Why could we not cast it out?' So Jesus said to them, 'Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting." 

(Matthew 17:14-21)

I think we could consider HERE our soul (the mind, will and emotions; where we make our decisions), and THERE the cross (where/how we learn to follow Him).

"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing (yet faithless and perverse in their ability), but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.' Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this age? Has God not made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe." 

(1 Corinthians 1:18-21)

So then, your faithlessness considers other things as it responds, rendering perverse actions contrary to Christ. We have to learn to follow Him, not the wisdom of the world.