What is love? We use the word so easily. I love this book, I love this perfume, I love this snack. We just about love everything there is except when we don’t. Then we may hate it or not care about it at all.
It seems like the word has lost all of its true meaning. It’s changed from being something special to being a way to describe something that, at that particular time, we simply like. We like to do, we like to eat, we like a lot of things but loving something is different.
I have certainly found myself using the word carelessly. I’ve been trying to catch myself when I do and change my wording to really reflect what I feel.
I’ve thought about it and except for people and other living things, I don’t know that I “love” much else. When I search what my heart says, I find that I can only really love something that has the potential to love me right back.
I say potential for a reason and that reason is that Jesus has told us that we are to love the souls of everyone. That includes people who actively hate those who follow Jesus. Even so, we are supposed to love them anyway.
What sort of sacrifice is it to simply love those who love you, too? You might ask, why should our love be compared to sacrifice? That is because we are told to love others like God loves us.
God loved us so much he sent his only son to be an atoning sacrifice for our sins. If Jesus had come to die for only those who already loved him, this world would have been forever doomed.
Instead, he came to die for those who hated him. Not just those who were alive at the time but for all those who came afterwards as well. That means all of us.
Not a one of us is born with the love of God in our hearts. On the contrary, we are born in sin. Even little toddlers can lie and purposefully disobey.
I have seen this in my three year old granddaughter recently. I will say, don’t do that, it will hurt you. And, of course, she immediately doubles down and continues until, guess what? She hurts herself.
She then cries out with pain and suffering and wants me to come and fix what is wrong. Of course, I do. Because I love her and I want the best for her. It never fails that she tells me she is sorry and that she won’t do it again. Until she does.
We are all a lot like little toddlers to God. He loves us dearly and has given a book called the Bible to tell us what we shouldn’t do, because if we do these things, we will hurt ourselves.
Those who aren’t Christians may sneer and then do these things anyway. Even Christians will find a way to justify doing something that is clearly not good.
When we do, we bring all sorts of pain and suffering either to ourselves or to others. When the pain reaches to the depth of our souls, many cry out to God to fix what is wrong. We say we are sorry and that we will never do such a thing again. Until we do.
But just like me with my granddaughter, God loves us so much, he will reach down from heaven and give us comfort and show his love for us.
That doesn’t mean that we won’t suffer the repercussions for our sins, it means that God will forgive us and help us in the way that he deems right.
The true definition of love is the love that God feels for us. He didn’t just feel love, he actually put love into action. When he sent his son to die for us, we didn’t love him. That’s real love. It is a love that seeks to save others even if it means sacrificing the most precious thing you can.
How many of us could do something like this? I’ll be honest, it isn’t me. I couldn’t have sent my son to save others. He might have done so himself but I would have been begging him not to do so. I would have wanted him to stay safe and sound with me.
What does that prove? It proves that I’m not God. I love my family and I would sacrifice myself but I would never send one of my loved ones knowing they would die.
It is this kind of unthinkable sacrificial action that really defines the essence of real and true love. God loved us and gave everything to save us.
Jesus lived as a human like us but was able to do something we could not do. He lived without sin. It wasn’t that he wasn’t tempted because Satan himself offered him the world if he would sin.
Jesus had to live without sin so that he could be the unblemished sacrifice that would atone for the world’s sin. He denied the human part of him that would have led him astray and instead, he lived the life that God wants us to live.
In return for this sacrifice, what are we expected to do to deserve it? Simply put, there is nothing we can do to earn it. It is a gift without strings. It is a pardon waiting for us to accept. That is all we have to do.
Acknowledge that Jesus was both man and God, he lived sinlessly and gave up his life for us. Because he was God, he also raised himself from the dead to show us that one day, we too, will be resurrected to new life. But then, he also wants us to start living the life the Bible calls us to do. He wants us to become his disciples and follow in his footsteps, doing everything he called us to do.
That includes, as a top priority, loving others. That means all others and not just those who love you back.
1 John 4:7-12
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.