04 January 2011

How we know what love is

"The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me."
~ Jesus praying to God, in the Garden of Gethsemane, as recorded in John 17:23



I received an excited text from a friend on Saturday evening citing the above verse and celebrating the wonderful, amazing fact that God (the Father) loves us with the same kind of love He has for the Son! Being my cross-referencing self, I found John 15:9, where Jesus says:
"As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love."


I have often & long pondered what love is. My most-savored definition for several years was C.S. Lewis' statement (which I believe is found in The Four Loves) that Love is not just a strong feeling for another person: It is a decision to act with their best interests in mind. For those of you who know me, this is why I like the film A Beautiful Mind so much - the love Alicia shows John in the midst of terrible hardship. I'm listening to the soundtrack as I type this. :-)
Last week I finished reading John Piper's A Sweet & Bitter Providence*, which studies the lives of Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz. One of the conclusions Piper draws from the book of Ruth is that "Love is what faith looks like when we trust the sovereign promises of God secured by the blood of Christ." This is quite an important distinction, and the purpose for this post.
(* I cannot recommend this book strongly enough - it took me long enough to read it, and it's really changed my thinking on several topics; the one addressed here has been the most salient in the last week.)

With the definition of love I subscribed to that it meant choosing to act with the best interests of the beloved in mind, I lost sight of the motive power for that love; viz., how can one continue to love another sinful person who is liable to hurt oneself without despairing and becoming cynical?
Proposition: One can't.

Love that commits to acting in the best interests of another sinful human can only leave the lover emptied and the beloved a cause to fear further hurt. This is no love - it lives in constant fear!
I John 4:18 says "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love."

Genuine love says, "I may be hurt - Christ loved perfectly, and He was crucified! - however, I trust the promises of God that His will will be accomplished, that He will be faithful to His promises, and that He will deliver me. And that is why I have no fear when I make the commitment to love another broken sinner who will undoubtedly hurt me, and whom I will hurt as well. For I too am broken."

"By this we know love, that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers." (I John 3:16);
"We love because He first loved us" (I John 4:19);
"If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." (John 15:10-12)

Christians are commanded to love as Christ loved;
Christians are empowered to love by believing the promises of God are theirs secured in the blood of Christ; and,
Christians are inspired to love by the eternal reflection of love portrayed within the Trinity as manifest in the Incarnation.

1 comment:

  1. I read this and was thinking AH beautiful and shamelessly convicting. Thank you bro. We aren't alone in this.

    <3
    C

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