Love redefined

Love is an interesting word in our culture. It's usually connected to emotion, feelings, and passion. But the Bible paints a completely different picture of what love is all about. As I read 1 John this morning I came to a passage and realized, as I read, that love (as the bible describes it) is a verb filled with action and demonstration. Our culture fills love with feelings while the bible describes actions and unselfishness. Here are John's words,

1 John 4:⁷ Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ⁸ Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. ⁹ 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.¹⁰ This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. ¹¹ Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. ¹² No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

God's love is filled with actions, activity, giving, and sacrifice. It's the defining mark of a Christian....at least it should be the defining mark of the Christian. It seems our culture today sees us as judges, Pharisees, critics and killjoys instead of lovers of the lost ones.

As I look for a photo to use for these thoughts all I can find are culturally connected photos. None of them show what this should look like lived out in our lives. It's difficult when all we see and hear about love is touched by feelings, emotions and desires. Love done well is described in decisions and actions, a demonstration and example of what God has done for us. Love is giving, sacrifice, and action.

In another of John's books he writes, "by this (love) all men will know you are my disciples." Love for others is the defining mark of a Christian. The problem is that we have redefined both the word "love" and the word "others".

Imagine if we took others to mean others different than us? Others who disagree with us, others who abort their babies, others who vote the "wrong way", others who drink, others who are divorced....and on the list goes. Imagine how different the Christian would be viewed if our definitions changed just a little.....

"By this (love) they will know you are my disciples."