HeadTheology

As promised from my other site here is what how I think one has to love another for it to be truly love.

Everyone wants to be loved. That comes as no surprise at all. But what the heck is love? What actions constitute loving actions? It cannot be merely giving someone what they want for if that was love then just about every kid would have rotten teeth from all the candy their parents let them eat by ‘loving’ them. Oftentimes loving someone can mean giving them medicine or information they do not want to take or hear but knowing giving them those things may make them a better person in the end.

I think that the Bible shows pretty explicitly what love is. It says twice in I John 4:8 and 16 that ‘God is love.’ That used to sound like a high brow philosophical idea until my friend mentioned that he could not love his wife unless he loved God. I don’t know why but it hit me that for me to love anyone in the truest sense I had to give them God. This fits right in with Wayne Grudem’s definition of God’s love from his Systematic Theology that “God’s love means that God eternally gives of himself to others.”

It would be arrogant for us to think we may improve upon that idea by giving anything that does not include the gospel or is God glorifying. The greatest act of love is the giving of God to someone. That may come in many different forms. It is sharing the gospel with them so that they may hear and believe but it may just be talking about God’s greatness, mercy, justice, or beauty in normal conversation.

Christ did this very same thing and we as Christians should be no different. By accomplishing the means by which men may be reconciled to the Father, Jesus Christ gives us God. Romans 5:6-8 says,

When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Now, no one is likely to die for a good person, though someone might be willing to die for a person who is especially good. But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

So it is the fact that our salvation is not based upon any love in us but it is all the love of God. We reeked of sin and hated God, naturally and willingly disobeying his commandment to love and honor Him. It is not that we loved the Lord but that the Lord loved us and has saved us.

So if love in its truest sense is giving God and showing his worth to someone else then would it not be true that those that are not Christians cannot truly love. But I think with that statement a problem arises that many professing Christians don’t want to talk about God even to other Christians unless they are forced to within the confines of church. So I want to encourage each of you to talk about God with everyone, talk about doctrine and His attributes so you glorify Him and be truly loving to others.