Faith First Media

What is Love?

by Matthew Elton

© 2010 Matthew Elton

matt@faithfirstmedia.com

"These things I command you, that you love one another."

--John 15:17

"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love."

--1 John 4:8

Throughout the Bible, we are commanded to love.  But how do we know what love is?  1 John provides the answer:

"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers."

--1 John 3:16 NIV

Jesus demonstrated the ultimate act of love when he died in our place. What more can you do for a person than sacrifice everything you are for them? It was the ultimate act of love because it demonstrated that he cared more about you and me than he did about his own life, and that is love - to care more about someone else than yourself.  I believe that the opposite of love is selfishness.  Love is inherently sacrificial, because it means denying your own desires in order to care for another person.  In the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37), the priest walked by the injured man and did not show love because he cared more about himself and getting to where he wanted to go than he did about helping someone in need.  The Samaritan showed love by sacrificing his own plans in order to care for someone else. Love is selfless.

"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

--John 15:13

Love requires action:

"If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?"

--James 2:15-16

Just as faith without works is dead (James 2:20) so love without action is dead.  Did the man who said "be ye warmed and filled" yet did nothing to help the person in need really show love?  He may have felt love in his heart and had the right intentions, but if a feeling isn't powerful enough to produce an action, it's useless.

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves."

--Philippians 2:3 NIV

To love is to care for someone else more than you care about yourself.  This must be demonstrated through action. Love without action is not love at all.  To heal the sick, feed the hungry, give to the poor, witness to the lost, and help the needy - these are labors of love that require sacrifice on our part.  If we cared only about our own selfish interests, we would never do these things, thus, we would never love. Love is selflessness and sacrifice, but our sacrifices will be richly rewarded in the age to come (Matthew 25:34-36).

"My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth."

--1 John 3:18