What Is Love?

Throughout human history men have perverted that which is good. They have warped ideas, changed meanings, and altered perceptions. Basically they call evil good and good evil (Isaiah 5:20). One of the worst offenses has been at the expense of love. People have twisted love to fit whatever is in their best interest. They make it mean what they want it to mean.

People fall in love and out of love on what seems to be a daily basis. Love and lust are continually confused for one another. Even well-meaning people are confounded by this basic and essential human emotion. So what is love?

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. --1 Corinthians 13:4-8a (ESV)

The Bible speaks often about love. Paul enumerates 15 qualities in this short passage, seven in the positive and eight in the negative, plus an eternal truth about love. Perhaps if more people would study what the Bible has to say about love they would be less apt to alter its meaning or be confused about what it really is. As to this "falling out of love" excuse, it's nonsense. Agape never ends. That means it does not cease. Love has permanence. That means when someone truly loves someone, that love never ceases. Nor do the actions taken on behalf of that person cease.

What is love?

In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 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. --1 John 4:10-11 (ESV)