Loving Others

Great confusion surrounds the nature of love in our society. At the risk of oversimplifying, we’ve equated love with a feeling of being special. Indeed, much of the infatuation we today call love is merely a sophisticated form of selfishness. We feel special when we are with somebody, and as such, we treat that person as special, thus making the person feel loved. This is basically the plot of most romantic movies; however, this view of love is far less innocent than it appears on film.

Our society has elevated this distorted concept of love as the ultimate virtue. As such, making someone feel unloved has become one of our culture’s greatest crimes. Given that love is equated with a feeling of being special, this crime centers around anything that makes a person feel unappreciated, misunderstood, rejected, or uncomfortable. Therefore, causing offense by exposing personal beliefs, lifestyle choices, and behaviors as spiritual lies is touted as being unloving—a nearly unforgivable crime worthy of being “cancelled” in our culture.

If this is true, then Jesus was far from a loving individual because He was constantly speaking offensive truths. Consider what He told the Pharisees: “You are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity. Outwardly you look like righteous people, but inwardly your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness. … Snakes! Sons of vipers! How will you escape the judgment of hell?” (Matt. 23:27b–28, 33).

In reality, biblical love is far less concerned about our feelings than it is about truth. Jesus tells Nicodemus that God loves the whole world enough to sacrifice His only son so that anyone can be restored in His relationship with God (John 3:16–17), but He also says, “Anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son” (John 3:18). God’s love is not sufficient to procure our salvation because true love refuses to overlook sin. To be saved, we need to identify our sin, turn from it, and submit our will to Jesus: If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved” (Rom. 10:9–10).

True love calls people to repentance because it is what they truly need. It refuses to prioritize feelings and to turn a blind eye to wickedness. Instead, it speaks God’s truth about our thinking and behavior. We should not be needlessly offensive, but we must love others enough to speak truth to error, even when it hurts. Becoming God’s cultural influencers requires a commitment to biblical love and to Jesus’ example of loving others by speaking truth into their lives.

This article comes from Heart of a Forerunner: How to Be a Relevant and Influential Voice in a Wayward Nation