Love is not Love

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. Mark 12:30

I was listening to a video of Voddie Baucham that is well worth the watch. While I wholeheartedly am a daughter of the Church, I rejoice when a Protestant speaks truth with clarity, even while our own leaders confuse. I have, of late, felt like a battered spouse as my friend so adeptly wrote about, so when something cuts through with clarity, it is worth sharing to help us focus and navigate these tumultuous times. If you haven’t time to watch the video, I will share briefly in my own words some of its insight here but I will use a Catholic bible translation (NCB).

So often we hear that “love is love”, and if any correction is offered a person can get labeled as “hateful.” But the truth is, true love is not hateful and there are things that the bible does tell us not to love. 

Do not love the world
or what is in the world.
If anyone does love the world,
the love of the Father is not in him. 1 John 2:15

So we ask ourselves, what “world” is being talked about that we are not to love? The verse goes on to say;

For everything that is in the world—
the concupiscence of the flesh,
the concupiscence of the eyes,
and the pride of life—
comes not from the Father
but from the world.
And the world with all its enticements
is passing away,
but whoever does the will of God
abides forever. 1 John 2:16-17

This verse spells out the “world” we are not to love. While most bible translations state, “desires” of the flesh, “lust” of the eyes and the “pride” of life, I love that this NCB translation uses the word “concupiscence.” I am not here to go into which translation is right. The Pastor in the video does not use concupiscence and still gets the point across clearly. I am here just to expound on what he was saying, and the word concupiscence reminds us of our Catholic roots and the fact that we are fallen and desire to do wrong things. We became disordered when we fell from grace, and we all have concupiscence. When we start to call our concupiscence and our sin “irregular” we do a disservice to the gravity of the fall from grace against an infinitely good God and we do a disservice to the immensity of God’s saving grace that wants to elevate and divinize us.

His divine power has bestowed on us everything that is necessary for life and for devotion through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and virtue. By these he has given us his precious promises, great beyond all price, so that through them you may escape from the corruption with which evil desires have infected the world and thereby may come to share in the divine nature. 2 Peter 1:3-4

Something “irregular” invokes imagery of being able to be made regular by man. While something sinful can only be made whole and healed and better than regular through surrender to the Divine Will. The latter takes repentance and reliance on God, not man. In our efforts to be empathetic I think we have become cruel. We steal from people the knowledge and understanding of the love of God by watering down truth in luke warm language.

When our source becomes anything other than God alone (Mark 10:18), then the source of our love is not of God. Thus, when the love comes from wrong desire or from pride, we can know that this love is not of God and we are told, do not love it. Our society seems unaware of this. Many of our church leaders do too. If I desire to fornicate outside of marriage, that is a disordered desire and must come to God and beg his mercy upon me. How do I know? Because scripture tells us;  

Are you not aware that wrongdoers will never inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, extortioners, drunkards, slanderers, swindlers—none of these will inherit the kingdom of God.  Some of you were once such as these. However, now you have been washed clean, you have been sanctified, you have been justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

We can know these things are wrong through natural law and because of the harm that comes to others and ourselves when we do these things. We may think there’s no harm, but there is, and it is why we are told not to do them. It isn’t because God wants to restrict us, but because God wants us to be glorified in Him, not of ourselves. 

It isn’t just the source of love that must be from God, but the object of our love must also be Godly. If we love the object so much so that it becomes our identity – I AM statements of anything other than being a child of God, then it is ungodly. It is actually idolatry. We all sin but when we identify as our sin or we identify others by their sin it is not of God.  

We can clearly see that loving the world has a twofold problem, a bad source (concupiscence) and a bad object (sin). The fruit of all this can also clearly be seen. The fruit is division, violence, depression, rage, anxiety, death and war.  Love is not love. A bad source and a bad object can send you to a place where there is no love if you don’t choose to change. True love is a person and Jesus really is the answer.

Ask yourself what is it that you love? If it isn’t God alone then bring your desires and attachments before God and surrender them. The Holy Spirit is just waiting to dwell within you, so you bear good fruit. 

In contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness,  gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. Galatians 5:22-23