Love one another as God loves us

Many calendars denote Feb. 14 as “Valentine’s Day.” Over the years, this has come to mean something. And look like something.

Remember Feb. 14 of fifth grade? Did you not stealthily drop a cardboard cupid into a decorated brown lunch bag belonging to your current crush? (Be honest.)

Understandably, to this day (and on this day!), Valentine, you know what to do: express your love to the beloved in your life — preferably by way of cards, candies, carnations, carats, cars or cash.

But why do this? Is there a law? An expectation? An inner desire? A reason?

I, for one, did not marry my fifth-grade sweetheart (if I even had one; she never got back to me). Yet since childhood, the thought of love — along with its feelings, its sight, its experience, its reciprocity, its essence, its logic — has wooed me. And why not? We’re talking about love!

As a pastor, I get to talk about love. A lot. The setting might be talking to teens in a group, or counseling young lovers looking forward, or listening to tired marriages whimper in private about love languished. Still — at least once a week — I also get the opportunity to talk about love publicly, from a pulpit.

Thankfully, when I talk, I do not need to depend on colorful cards, or my own charm, or the latest survey or the world’s wisdom on the subject — which commonly equates love with blissful romance, or raw emotion, or temporary physical pleasures, or even as something that sounds strangely accidental or arbitrary (i.e. “I fell in love with you; I can’t help it! ...”).

Higher, deeper, and wider is God’s love (Ephesians 3:7-19). His love is neither distant nor a secret; he was pleased to reveal it.

This revealing finds expression in 1 John 4:7-12, where the apostle explains more than a love-language, or a love vibe. Significantly, his exhortation to love one another is anchored in God himself — in his character, his work. “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God. ... In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

A pulpit outline for this passage might expound the rationale this way: Love one another because God 1) says love 2) sources love 3) is love 4) showed love 5) so loved. In other words, God gives a reason to love, offering a “theo-logic” that rightly moves the mind, will, emotions, faith — and feet — of God’s people. Followed this way, talk of love addresses not merely the matter of love’s how-to, but includes love’s “be-cause.”

Truly, in Jesus, God reveals how, and why, we are to love.

Long past fifth-grade Februaries, this meaningful expression from God revealing true love gives me plenty of reason to receive that love for myself, to reflect it to those around me, and to return it to the one who first loved (1 John 4:19).

This story was originally published February 13, 2016 at 5:38 AM with the headline "Love one another as God loves us."