Hi dear readers, thanks for joining me for another week on this little corner of the internet. I hope you are all having a wonderful week so far!
As I sat down at my desk to write this week’s blog post, with my protein shake on one side and decaf coffee on the other, I didn't struggle as much as last time to figure out what I wanted to talk about. God placed it on my heart to write about what love is according to His standard, and contrast it with what the world teaches us about it.
While love may seem like a fairly basic topic, I do think it’s important to go back to the basics - regardless of whether you are a seasoned believer, only recently became a Christian, don't know what you believe, or are not a believer at all.
My hope is that this blog post would remind my readers of God’s perfect design for love, and help us to strive for His version of love, instead of settle for that of the world.
Let’s jump in!
Before jumping in to the meat of the subject, I wanted to first calibrate on what is the definition of love, as defined in the English dictionary. I went straight to Google and typed in “definition of love”. This is what I found:
At first glance, love seems to be associated with a strong feeling of affection towards someone or something. I’m sure we’ve all felt this type of love, whether it be towards our family, friends, significant other, or pets. We may also go as far as to say that we love a certain sport, book, or activity that brings us joy.
While this simple definition of love seems straightforward and without harm, it pales in comparison to the Biblical definition of love - and here’s why: while the world defines love as a feeling or emotion, the Bible does not refer to love as a feeling but rather a choice, an action.
This may not sound as romantic or exciting, I'll give you that. But I’m here to break down why this is so much more meaningful.
From a biblical perspective, love can be defined as the commitment to meet someone else’s needs, even if your own needs are not yet met. This standard of love does not fluctuate even when circumstances change, but rather remains constant and steady. I like to think of true biblical love as how you choose to treat someone in the moments when you don't like them, rather than how you treat them when everything is sunshine and rainbows.
C.S. Lewis, well-known author of the Chronicles of Narnia among many other books, wrote:
This is a very different message from what we hear in the world. Indeed, if the world’s definition of love has to do with feelings, what does one do when the feelings fluctuate or go away?
The way of the world inevitably leads to broken marriages, where each person is given a green light to walk away once the feelings are not what they used to be, rather than honoring the life-long commitment made to one another.
It leads to friendships ending, when a person is no longer getting what they want, or is unable to forgive.
It leads to a world where we love others only when we feel like it, and only after we have taken care of our own needs first. This latter part is often done under the guise of “self-care”, a new-age concept that has completely removed others and their needs so long as our own wants and needs are not first met (which realistically could be forever.)
Now let’s pause for a second, because I know the type of love Christians are called to may seem demanding, even exhausting at times. How can we find the strength to love like that?
The Bible gives us a hint in 1 John 4:19: “We love because He loved us first”
As Christians, we have to remember that nothing we are called to do needs to be accomplished in our own strength - and that includes love too.
The type of love we are called to act upon in our lives should be independent of what we receive in return: in other words, we must love others with the knowledge that we may never receive it back.
Jesus gives us the perfect example of this type of love, in that He chose to sacrifice Himself for humanity with the knowledge that we may not choose to love Him back.
Imagine if we applied Christ's mentality to our approach to loving others, how the world would change. Imagine doing things for others without expecting anything in return. It's really hard to do that sometimes, but that is our higher calling as believers.
I am just finishing up pastor John Piper's book called Don't Waste Your Life and I found one of the last paragraphs in the book to be very well put:
"Love is this: at great expense you made yourself my glory and my boast. The cost was infinite by which you made yourself the Treasure of my life. You sent your Son, the blazing center of your beauty and your love. You gave him up to mockers, betrayal, thorns, the whip, the rod, the firsts, the nails, the shame, and death. For what? To swallow up your wrath, and satisfy your righteousness, and bury all my sins as far as east is from the west and in the deepest sea, so that I might come home and see the galaxy. This is your love, of, God, not to make much of me, but do whatever must be done so that I waken to the joy of making much of you through all eternity."
The fulness that one has from accepting the Gospel is the very fuel that provides us the courage and compassion to share it with others too, without letting the fear of rejection get in the way of the message.
Loving others means telling them the truth, with the hopes that it will bring them the only freedom that is everlasting and genuine: the freedom of knowing our salvation and hope is in Jesus Christ, no matter what is happening in our lives and in the world.
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