The idea of love has lost its meaning in most cases today. Every time we use the word love, it seems to have equal bearing no matter whether we are talking about inanimate objects, an animal, or another person. Today, we are going to deal with how off centered the experience of loving has become for even the Christian. Jesus made it very clear in Luke 10:27 that there is a special kind of love that is expected of us above and beyond what we normally consider as sincere affection.
Of course, we know that God’s love is called agape. Emotions are not the center of this kind of love. There really is nothing worthy of love for mankind. We surround ourselves and involve ourselves in all types of sin and degradation. On the contrary, God’s love is a decision. In spite of who and what we are, God has made the choice to love us. Furthermore, he loves us as we are. That’s why John 3:16 is so significant. Jesus became the means and expression of God’s love for us. Our ambition from God is to mimic that kind of love. However, we have taken this love and distorted it. We have wrapped it in emotions that have nothing to do with who we are and what we have decided. Let us look at examples of our misdeeds in regard to love as we express it.
Physical love is really a physical pleasure. It suits our own selfish purpose for what we can enjoy for ourselves as we experience the physical acts involved in what we call love. The fact is that this type of love has its own ulterior motive.
Then we express love as a means to gain something from another. It has its own ulterior motives. It may only be verbal. It is a shallow contract to interact with someone else as long as we get what we want.
Conditional love can be very damaging to relationships. It basically says that I will if you will. It places expectations that are self-centered. This is totally contrary to what Jesus said when he mentioned that we are to even love our enemies.
Manipulative love has at its baseline an element of power or control. It may not be emotional but only verbal. It is offered to another person for what we think they want to hear and not what we can give to them.
Impulsive love has no boundaries. It too is emotional but offered on the spur of the moment. It is said to another person without the slightest hesitation or censorship for what the consequences might be.
Disloyal love may start out with sincere intent. Still, it has no stability within the heart. If something better or someone else seems better that comes along, then the allegiances suddenly changed.
Another kind of love is for things and not people. It could be for monetary gain. It could be for fame or fortune. It could be for the inanimate. The reminder we must give ourselves is that we should never love something that cannot love us back.
Love that has a low priority is the kind that offers oneself without any consideration of the ramifications. If views the experience of love almost as a necessary evil while other things, opinions, situations could easily replace it.
Then there is self-love. This is two-pronged. Jesus said that we are to love other people as we do our own selves.(Mark 12:33) Jesus expects us to have a healthy love for ourselves not out of egotism but of care. So then if we are going to care for ourselves because we love ourselves, then we must love others. However, in most cases it is carried too far because self-love becomes selfish with ulterior purposes that only does good for self.
It is a challenge to love as God loves. Those in your realm of reference are those you must decide to love no matter what their attitude or behavior towards you. It will surprise you how much that other person changes because you have changed. Let the love of God shine through you for that’s what he desires.
Christian Writer 