| Each of us is able to love, otherwise God would not have
commanded us to do it, but our love is without exception imperfect. Jesus
Christ is the only person that has been able to purely love, and nobody
has loved more than He has loved. God's example and commandments give
us instruction on how to love properly and more abundantly. Since
love is something we should be doing, it is related to morality. Indeed,
love and morality share a great deal of commonality. God's dealings with us throughout history are an example of love. The pinnacle of God's history of loving us was demonstrated in the life of Jesus Christ here on Earth. Jesus commanded us, "But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you," (Luke 6:27). Obviously this does not mean that we should not love our friends, or family. Therefore, we should love everybody, including our enemies. If we can love our enemies, then we can love anybody, and everybody. It is to be in our character to love. In addition to His examples, through the Bible, God has given us a definition of love: Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth...If you are not at comfortable, and many of us are not, with the King James Version of the Bible, there is a more current rendition in the quote below. As an aside, each of us should seek out a legitimate modern translation of the Bible that we can study. The original Greek the for the word, "charity," is "agape," which is commonly defined as a "brotherly love," or love, or charity. For comparison, another commonly mentioned Greek love is, "eros," which has a more sexual meaning. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy. Love is not proud. It does not behave improperly, or seek its own interest. It is not easily angered, nor does it assume evil intent, or rejoice in injustice, but rejoices in the truth, excuses failings, and has faith, hope, and endurance. Love never fails...From this definition we can observe a couple things. First, the definition is not about emotions, it defines love as an activity that requires choices. Second, this definition indicates that love is in balance with justice and truth. There needs to be a proper balance between all things and God is the ultimate authority on where to strike those balances. To exemplify the counter balance to love, consider these verses: Thus saith the LORD of hosts, ... go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.Where is the love? This is a difficulty we face. God is God and that affords Him some privileges that we do not understand. For example, God has a perspective on all of history that escapes us. God commands life and death, and judgment, both temporal and eternal. God is a just God and able to perfectly judge each of us individually with a divine balance of justice and mercy. His justice and love co-exist. What we can learn from this for our own understanding is that the expression of love has a place. A distinction can be made between, what might be called, effectual love and non-effectual love. Although God's love for each of us is enduring, we can still find ourselves condemned to hell on the judgment day. So what good is His love? His love is in balance with His judgment. If God were to let some people harm other, innocent, people and let the offenders go, then we might ask, "what good is His Righteousness?" The same happens with us, we can love somebody always, but we may not be able to express love always, nor express our love completely. True love is unconditional love, but true love always has conditional expression. We too have to balance our love with the other realities of our lives such as justice, and righteousness. As an example, consider the parents of a, now adult, child that they are aware has committed a felony. The parents have to balance their love for the child with what is right and just. This may mean turning the child over to authorities, but it does not mean that they stop loving the child. Perhaps, they visit their child in prison, or assist with court costs, or provide sound advice, or simply hope. Love motivates them to do what they properly can do. If we have feelings of adoration, or affection, for somebody, we can more easily love them, but love is not to be based on emotions. Our emotions can inform us, but the are not to control us. If our love is based on our emotions towards others, then if our emotions change, so might our love for them change. If our love is based on our perceptions of others, then if our perceptions change, so might our love for them change. If our love is based on what others do, then if they do differently, so might our love for them be different. If our love is simply on them, then our love is as secure as we can make it. If we were not loved by God, we may only experience His justice, which would be very bad for us sinners. Fortunately God loves us for His own reasons and because He is God, we can be assured that His love for us is secure. That is not to ignore His justice, but recognize that His love is balanced with His justice. Likewise, our love for others should be a commitment to them and confirmed to ourselves. Then our love is secure, even if our expression of that love is constrained. We gauge many things by our own experiences. If, though, our experiences, or gifts and handicaps as well, are not the same as another persons, then our perceptions may work against us. It can be difficult for us to relate to others that have different musical ability, linguistic ability, athletic ability, social skills, etc. than we do. In the case of love, if we have difficulty loving, then we may find it hard to believe that others can love us. We may also doubt God's love for us. If love were only a matter of our perception, then some of us may be unreachable even by God. Consider the verse, "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us," (Romans 5:8 ), which indicates that even with our truly unlovable aspects, God still loves us. Furthermore, "We love him, because he first loved us," (1 John 4:19). This verse indicates that God's love for us is able to change us. So because God does love us, and His love changes us, we can love Him and we can love ourselves and we can love others. For some of us loving others may come easily, which would perhaps make us, think that we are closer to God. That is not necessarily so. God makes each of us unique with different abilities and, in this fallen world, handicaps. Although we may be gifted, or afflicted, God has not made our choices for us. It is by our choices that we come closer to God. Loving God as best we can, will result in a purification of our love for both Him and each other. Love without God is tainted by our improper selfishness. True love can be characterized to a great extent as selflessness. Some of us may wonder, though, if selfishness is not at the core of everything we do, including selflessness. That actually may be the case, but what we need to learn is where selfishness' proper place is. If we find peace, or joy, or fulfillment, in our faith and obedience to God, then we are receiving positive feedback for our behavior; positive feedback being that which appeals to our selfish nature. This, though, is a selfishness in its proper place. There is a sense of oneness, or fellowship, associated with love. We are indicating, through love, that we consider our life to be in service to another's life. Our lives are all that we have and they are therefore the most valuable thing that we have. By committing our lives to the support of another person's life, love communicates that we value the other person. Consider that Jesus Christ supported us in overcoming our sin, something we were incapable of doing on ourselves. Although He used His life in service to us, He is still greater than us. Therefore, loving another does not devalue our lives. In fact, by expanding the purpose of our life beyond ourselves, we may increase the value of our lives by loving others. |