Do you - Christian, know what love is?
In my considerable experience, I will say that less than five in one-hundred professing Christians know what love is. And NOT ONE unsaved person knows what love is.
Does that sound outrageous to you? Why, then, do you suppose, is the divorce rate in the 'Church' comparable to the divorce rate among the unsaved? And among those Christian marriages which have not yet ended in divorce, why are there so few examples of truly godly marriages in the Church? Why do the vast majority of children raised in Christian homes turn their backs on Christ after they leave home (if not before)? Why is the Church NOT impacting the culture - positively - for Christ? Where is the preponderance of evidence in the lives of Christians -- who are supposed not only to know what love is but who also claim that their own lives are characterized by "love"?How can we know what love is?
Who is competent and possesses authority to DEFINE what love is? Who commissioned Noah Webster - or anyone else for that matter - to define what is love? It has come to be the case in this so-called era of "postmodernism," that words have meaning only by some kind of "consensus" of opinion. Words (it is supposed,) possess no objective meaning; that is to say, that no word should be taken by everyone and at all times to mean any certain thing. The meaning of words, postmodernists claim, is not static (fixed) but dynamic (changeable) and "contextual". Take for example the word "gay". Not many years ago, virtually everyone understood that "gay" meant "happy," "merry-hearted". But no one dares to use the word "gay" in that sense, today, because the "consensus" of public opinion now ascribes an altogether different meaning to the word "gay".
But this is not a lesson in postmodernism. I am merely trying to emphasize the need to establish the true meaning of the word "love". I will ask the question, again: Who is competent and possesses authority to DEFINE what love is?
God in His own Word (the Bible) has clearly and explicitly defined what love is:
"God is love" (1 John 4:7b)
Note that it does not say that God "has" love, but that God "is" love. And since God acts from Himself and He IS love, therefore, everything God does must be an expression of love. Right? Not exactly, no. For, while it is true that "God is love," yet the Bible nowhere states that "God is love - and nothing else". The God who "is love" is also the same God who destroys, who executes eternal wrath and vengeance against all His enemies.
How is it possible, then, that the God who "is love" and whose every action necessarily is from Himself, can ever act in any way contrary to His own nature, that is to say, in any way contrary to love? How can the seeming riddle be solved? The answer - though simple, yet it is not simplistic: God has a will; and the exercise of His own will is an aspect of His own divine nature - which allows God perfect and complete freedom of action: either to love or to hate; to create or to destroy; to kill or to make alive.
Thus, we conclude (and Scripture agrees) that: 1) "God is love", and only that which accords with the beneficent nature of God is love; and, 2) every word and deed which originates in and from love is necessarily manifested and carried forth by an act of will. God is love; and God is "good", the Bible attests. God's goodness does not prevent God from acting in ways to protect His own Creation but, rather, His goodness in fact moves Him to protect His Creation against every intransigent threat to God's Kingdom. Let's see what Scripture has to say about the nature of God's love being expressed -- both positively and negatively - according to His own will:
God created and will forever sustain a reality called Hell. That reality called Hell is NOT discordant with God's nature. To be sure, Hell is not an expression of God's love toward all who suffer there. But Hell exists because God loves His Creation in Christ Jesus; and God will protect His own Kingdom which He loves.
How is it possible, then, that the God who "is love" and whose every action necessarily is from Himself, can ever act in any way contrary to His own nature, that is to say, in any way contrary to love? How can the seeming riddle be solved? The answer - though simple, yet it is not simplistic: God has a will; and the exercise of His own will is an aspect of His own divine nature - which allows God perfect and complete freedom of action: either to love or to hate; to create or to destroy; to kill or to make alive.
Thus, we conclude (and Scripture agrees) that: 1) "God is love", and only that which accords with the beneficent nature of God is love; and, 2) every word and deed which originates in and from love is necessarily manifested and carried forth by an act of will. God is love; and God is "good", the Bible attests. God's goodness does not prevent God from acting in ways to protect His own Creation but, rather, His goodness in fact moves Him to protect His Creation against every intransigent threat to God's Kingdom. Let's see what Scripture has to say about the nature of God's love being expressed -- both positively and negatively - according to His own will:
"I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him" (Hosea 14:4)
"All their wickedness is in Gilgal: for there I hated them: for the wickedness of their doings I will drive them out of mine house: I will love them no more..." (Hosea 9:15)Not incidentally, both of the above quotes are taken from the same book in the Bible.
God created and will forever sustain a reality called Hell. That reality called Hell is NOT discordant with God's nature. To be sure, Hell is not an expression of God's love toward all who suffer there. But Hell exists because God loves His Creation in Christ Jesus; and God will protect His own Kingdom which He loves.
God is love. Therefore, it is only possible for any human being to know what love is, according to his or her capacity (and will-ingness) to get to know Him who is love. LOVE IS A PERSON (the triune God). That is the Bible definition of what love is. Pure and simple. No more. And no less. Whatever God is - in His character, in His will, and in His actions: that is what love is, and that is how love acts. NOTHING ELSE IS LOVE. ONLY THAT WHICH IS PERFECTLY AGREEABLE WITH GOD'S CHARACTER AND WILL IS LOVE.
On God's part, HE IS LOVE. On our part, only that (our thoughts, words and deeds) which is in accordance with God's will - is love. But how can we know what manner of IDEAS, ATTITUDES, SPEECH and CONDUCT is "according to God's own nature and will"? In other words, how can we "get to know Him who is love"? We can know what love is, only to extent that we understand God's nature and will - accordingly as God has revealed Himself to mankind in the Bible.
In other words, on our part, only those beliefs, attitudes, words, and actions which are agreeable with God's own nature and will, as He has revealed His nature and will in Scripture, ONLY THAT IS "LOVE".
What love is NOT
We can now say with authority what love is NOT. Love is not what the world thinks or says it is. Love is not an emotion. Love is not a feeling. Love is not any attitude of heart or mind, nor is it any word or deed, which is contrary to God's Word. It should not be too difficult to understand, therefore, that the world knows NOTHING of the reality of "love"; excepting, only, what measure of "light" from God may for a season remain in each individual's own conscience - unless and until such light may be extinguished due to the "hardening" (or what Scripture calls the "searing") of the conscience by persistent rebellion against God.
The world's ideas of love are profoundly perverted. The world - having not the knowledge of God - confuses many things with love. The world confuses lust with love; lust being a desire for physical and/or emotional pleasure derived by whatever means. The world's ideas of love are sentimental and sensuous - and entirely separated from any consideration of God's nature and will.
The world confuses its own value system with love. For example, the world supposes that, to "love" members of the so-called "gay community," means giving homosexuals 'protected' (preferential) legal and social status. Whereas, the Bible calls homosexuality an "abomination" in the sight of God.
The world moreover confuses even pain and sorrow with love. How many so-called "love songs" have been written which confuse betrayal and even brutality with love? The world even thinks of sadomasochism as an expression of love.
More difficult to discern - yet no less perverse - is, that the world oftentimes confuses love with what, to the world, appear to be 'good' deeds; though such deeds, in fact, are contrary to God's Word. For example: The world believes it is an act of love to kill living human beings: they have even coined unique words to describe those so-called 'acts of love', viz.: "eugenics" (meaning 'good birth') and "euthanasia" (meaning 'good death'). Eugenics entails abortion and/or infanticide; while euthanasia entails killing more generally.
But even other, more mundane acts which, though they may appear 'good' to the world, yet those acts may be contrary to the will of God. Take, for example, the case of a wife who gives her husband a bottle of expensive brandy for Christmas. Does she thus express "love" toward her husband? The world would say, "Yes". God's Word says, No!
Finally, the world does not perceive love when it is actually manifested. The single greatest proof of that involves the world's abhorrence of the love of God in Jesus Christ. How can anyone believe that the world knows anything, really, about love?
Conclusion
Christians who desire and are purposed to experience genuine Revival, must seek out and return to walk in the "old paths" of righteousness. Righteousness is not whatever we - in the vanity of our own imagination may think that it is (regardless of how well-intentioned we may suppose that to be). But righteousness (right thinking, right believing, right speaking, right judgment and decision-making, right conduct) IS WHAT GOD SAYS IT IS.
God is love. We are commanded by God to love. Which simply means that we are commanded - at all times and in every situation - to think, speak and act in accordance with the revealed will of God in His Word:
In other words, on our part, only those beliefs, attitudes, words, and actions which are agreeable with God's own nature and will, as He has revealed His nature and will in Scripture, ONLY THAT IS "LOVE".
What love is NOT
We can now say with authority what love is NOT. Love is not what the world thinks or says it is. Love is not an emotion. Love is not a feeling. Love is not any attitude of heart or mind, nor is it any word or deed, which is contrary to God's Word. It should not be too difficult to understand, therefore, that the world knows NOTHING of the reality of "love"; excepting, only, what measure of "light" from God may for a season remain in each individual's own conscience - unless and until such light may be extinguished due to the "hardening" (or what Scripture calls the "searing") of the conscience by persistent rebellion against God.
The world's ideas of love are profoundly perverted. The world - having not the knowledge of God - confuses many things with love. The world confuses lust with love; lust being a desire for physical and/or emotional pleasure derived by whatever means. The world's ideas of love are sentimental and sensuous - and entirely separated from any consideration of God's nature and will.
The world confuses its own value system with love. For example, the world supposes that, to "love" members of the so-called "gay community," means giving homosexuals 'protected' (preferential) legal and social status. Whereas, the Bible calls homosexuality an "abomination" in the sight of God.
The world moreover confuses even pain and sorrow with love. How many so-called "love songs" have been written which confuse betrayal and even brutality with love? The world even thinks of sadomasochism as an expression of love.
More difficult to discern - yet no less perverse - is, that the world oftentimes confuses love with what, to the world, appear to be 'good' deeds; though such deeds, in fact, are contrary to God's Word. For example: The world believes it is an act of love to kill living human beings: they have even coined unique words to describe those so-called 'acts of love', viz.: "eugenics" (meaning 'good birth') and "euthanasia" (meaning 'good death'). Eugenics entails abortion and/or infanticide; while euthanasia entails killing more generally.
But even other, more mundane acts which, though they may appear 'good' to the world, yet those acts may be contrary to the will of God. Take, for example, the case of a wife who gives her husband a bottle of expensive brandy for Christmas. Does she thus express "love" toward her husband? The world would say, "Yes". God's Word says, No!
Finally, the world does not perceive love when it is actually manifested. The single greatest proof of that involves the world's abhorrence of the love of God in Jesus Christ. How can anyone believe that the world knows anything, really, about love?
Conclusion
Christians who desire and are purposed to experience genuine Revival, must seek out and return to walk in the "old paths" of righteousness. Righteousness is not whatever we - in the vanity of our own imagination may think that it is (regardless of how well-intentioned we may suppose that to be). But righteousness (right thinking, right believing, right speaking, right judgment and decision-making, right conduct) IS WHAT GOD SAYS IT IS.
God is love. We are commanded by God to love. Which simply means that we are commanded - at all times and in every situation - to think, speak and act in accordance with the revealed will of God in His Word:
"[H]ereby we do know that we know [God], if we keep his commandments." (1 John 2:3)
"For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous." (1 John 5:3)To "love" means to think, speak, and act like God. Everything else is a lie.
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