The first epistle of St. John is a letter addressed to the churches of Asia, in this letter the Apostle emphasizes to live in Charity. The Love of Charity in Greek has another name: Agape. The apostle reminds us that love is a genre, not all love is good: "do not love the world, or anything in the world" 1 John 2:15. The Apostle identifies the new commandment with the perfection of love: the Love of Charity. The gifts are perfections, some of these "charism" are gifts like Mercy and the Council, others are divine attributes such as Eternity and Omnipotence. Charity as a charism is a "gift", we inherit the Charity from God.
Agape is the love for the good, through it we know God. What does this mean? It means that the Love of Charity and the knowledge of God always go together, as faces of the same coin. Recall that the Theology tells us that the angels are created in the same contemplation of God. To know God is to contemplate him, that is meaning of the contemplative activity and that is the difference with simple meditation. Contemplative activity is the meditation  focused in the divine attributes of God, is the meditation focused in the non communicable spiritual gifts as the omnipontence, the eternity.
Love good and not just to love, is to contemplate, that's what John teaches us, that when we love a with a pure heart and free from evil thoughts that is where we find God. The Good love, love of Charity teaches us God.