The God Kind of Love vs Natural Human Love
Whoever does not (or cannot) love, does not know God- for God is love. 1 John 4:8
Many of the experiences and the beliefs we have about love fall short of the genuine love of God. Just like the rest of creation, our human nature was terminally crippled by sin. In that sad transformation, our ability to give and receive love was crippled. The selfless love for which we were created was fundamentally changed to a self-centred love substitute. To understand this better we can compare some of the characteristics of God’s love, with natural or fallen human love.
The God Kind Of Love
The New Testament church adopted a new word for love, so they could adequately describe the love of God. The word is ‘agape’. Agape had very little use in the secular Greek world, especially in the context of ‘love’. One 1st Century inscription has been found of the word ‘agape’ that refers to a soldier’s unswerving loyalty and regard for his military leader. The Church adopted ‘agape’ to mean a selfless, unsolicited and unconditional concern for the well being of others.
For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten son ... John 3:16
God demonstrated His love for us, that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. Romans 5:8
God’s love for us is not based on any personal insufficiency in God, but rather His desire for our well being. God exists in eternal light and love, with or without us, so He doesn’t have a self-centred need for love. He loves us, for our benefit.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7 is a description of what God’s love looks like.
Love endures with patience and serenity, love is kind and thoughtful, and is not jealous or envious; love does not brag and is not proud or arrogant. It is not rude; it is not self-seeking, it is not provoked [nor overly sensitive and easily angered]; it does not take into account a wrong endured. It does not rejoice at injustice but rejoices with the truth [when right and truth prevail]. Love bears all things [regardless of what comes], believes all things [looking for the best in each one], hopes all things [remaining steadfast during difficult times], endures all things [without weakening]. Love never fails [it never fades nor ends]. 1 Cor 13:4-8 Amp.
The God kind of love always acts for the well being of the other person. Its motivation is not for self-recognition, or to meet its own needs, but to meet the needs of the other person.
Natural Human Love
By contrast, we have come to use the word ‘love’ very loosely. We ‘love’ TV shows, cars, fashion, or football. If you consider what we mean when we say ‘love’ in these instances, the reason behind our ‘love’ is how those things make us feel. For example, we may ‘love’ fast red cars, because, imperfectly, they enhance our self-image and make us more desirable and attractive to others. That kind of love is self-centred. Ultimately, it can never fulfill our deepest needs. Natural human love is tainted by sin, it’s source is a fallen self-centred need and it seeks fulfillment from things that can never satisfy.
On the surface, natural human love can look much like the love of God. If you were to plant two similar fruit trees in a garden and one was planted in good soil, watered with pure water and nourished by life-giving nutrients, while the other was planted in poisoned soil and starved of nutrients, they both may grow to look similar, but the poisoned tree would always produce deficient fruit. The other would produce sweet life-giving fruit. Natural human love will always, in varying degrees, be deficient and insufficient in meeting our spiritual and emotional needs.
Natural human love craves for recognition and meaningful relationship connections for the purpose of self-affirmation. Natural love is planted in soil that is tainted by insecurity, guilt and self-righteousness. Ironically, while longing to be fully known and fully loved, natural human love fears that if it is fully known, it will not be fully loved. It fears judgment and rejection. In this sense, natural human love is contrary to the God kind of love.
And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world, we are like Jesus. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. (1 John 4:16-19 NIV)
The cure for any counterfeit is the real thing. For us to love like God loves we must first know the love of God: God’s love in us is a response to the knowledge of His love.
