Rom 13:9b-10 “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbour; therefore love is the fulfilment of the law.
Sometimes that simplest of words in our bibles hide a significant meaning. This is true for this word “fulfilment”. Jesus had used it in the Sermon on the Mount when He said, Mat 5:17 “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.” He is not using the word keep or obey with regards to the law, but fulfil. What has changed? The basis of God’s people living the way God desires has changed. We see the reason behind this change earlier in the book of Romans when Paul writes, Rom 5:5 … the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit … God is no longer expecting us to obey the dictates of the Law to achieve the behaviour He so longs for in His people, but rather He has put within us His love. This love, it was, that caused God to send His only Son to die for us. This same love now resides in each of those who were true believers in Jesus Christ. This indwelling love ensures that each believer has a great desire to cause no harm to those around them, and rather to have a burning desire to be a blessing to all that they met. And because believers now live from this heart spring of love to others, their behaviour towards them fulfils the requirements God had set down in His law, and go beyond a legal interpretation of keeping the law, into a state of being a positive blessing to all.
Has God shed abroad His love in your heart