Love Others as I have Loved You

A perspective on love

At an early age we are taught the concept of “opposites”. The opposite of heads is tails. The opposite of hot is cold. The opposite of light is dark. And the opposite of good is bad. Although I wouldn’t disagree with calling each of these pairs opposites, a different perspective on some of them can be insightful.

In the case of heads and tails there is no question about those being opposites. When a coin is flipped you can only have two results: heads or tails. Technically, a coin could land on its side but I’ve never heard anyone who flipped a coin ask “Heads, tails or side?” The odds of a coin landing on its side are not worth considering. Therefore, heads and tails have to be opposites because they are mutually exclusive of each other. If the coin is tails, the only way to get to heads is to completely flip the coin over.

The other pairs are slightly different. Not everything is heads or tails. There are varying degrees or spectrums where things can fall. The world doesn’t flip over from night into immediate day. As the sun rises, darkness is slowly dispelled into full daylight. As winter turns to spring and summer, temperatures rise slowly. From a scientific perspective, dark is not so much the opposite of light as the absence of light and cold is not so much the opposite of hot as it is the absence of heat.

Love and hate are the same way. Hate exists only in the absence of love and love can be measured out in degrees. Hate is not flipped into love as flipping a coin. The notion that hate and love are opposites can lead one to a false sense of security about their love for others. One might say “I don’t hate that person, therefore I am fulfilling God’s law of love.” But is this true?

Setting the comfort level

Consider the sun as it sits high in the sky on a cloudless day. The light is blinding. If the brightness of the sun is too uncomfortable, we put on sunglasses. When the heat outside is uncomfortable, we go inside and turn on the air conditioning. Light and heat can be blocked as much as necessary in order to be comfortable. Light and heat only affect our environment to the extent we allow. So it is with love. When love is uncomfortable, one can turn down the dial and still claim that there is love.

At love’s lowest setting, there is “forgive and forget”. This is the setting for enemies and those who hurt us. One decides they will not seek revenge and simply forget about any hurtful incident. If the other person is present, they are avoided. There is no attempt at reconciliation. There are no greetings or kind words or acts of kindness. That would be too uncomfortable. One’s conscience is cleared, however, by claiming the person is not hated. There is no revenge or acts of anger toward the other person, so God must be pleased.

In some cases, love is turned down simply because one decides the other person doesn’t deserve love. Maybe they have a different culture. Maybe they don’t share the same Christian beliefs. Maybe they are guilty of living an unholy lifestyle. Their transgressions must be made known. Their sinful ways must be punished. It’s okay, God’s law must be upheld.

Love is usually dialed up to the highest level for people in whom there is an emotional attachment. We are comfortable with these people and so capable of giving them all our love. We overlook faults, help them in times of need and would do anything for them. The only caveat being...if they fail to maintain our esteem or transgress us in any way, the dial of love gets turned down.

 When one follows the concept that love is the opposite of hate, one can easily justify setting the dial of love anywhere and believing that God’s command to love others is being fulfilled. But this is not God’s will for love. “As I have loved you, so you must love one another” (John 13:34).

The fullness of love

In Ephesians 3:14-21, we find a prayer that Paul wrote for all readers of his letter. Paul writes, “and know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19). God is love (1 John 4:8). To be filled with the fullness of God is to be filled with His fullness of love.

Having the fullness of love means loving every person fully, including enemies and those who hurt us.  Love cannot be claimed by simply saying there is no hatred towards others. Love is not the absence of hate. The fullness of love must be tested by comparing our love for every person to the love Jesus gives to us. God’s love is described by Paul in 1 Corinthians 13. Love is patient, kind, humble, gentle, unselfish, slow to anger, forgiving and so on. Love requires sacrifice. We may never be called to sacrifice our life for others as Jesus sacrificed Himself for us. However, love does require sacrificing pride, judgment, anger and so on.

The fullness of love that God calls us to may seem too difficult, but it is not as hard as one might think. It is only difficult if one relies on the abilities of human love. Human love is emotional, frail and incapable of fulfilling our Lord’s command to love others. Human love fails, so we need a kind of love that never fails (1 Corinthians 13:8).

“The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit” (Romans 5:5). God fills our heart with His love like a fire hose filling up a glass. The fire hose of God’s love is never turned off. Once our own heart is filled with love, God’s love overflows from our heart into everyone around us. It is God’s love we give to others, not our human love. In fact, the love we give to God is the love He first gives to us. “We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

Our love for God and for others may not be perfect. Human nature sometimes blocks God’s love like sunglasses blocking the sun’s light. If we don’t receive the fullness of love, we can’t give the fullness of love. This takes us back to the importance of knowing God personally loves us regardless of anything life sends our way. (See my article Loving God: The Six Stages). Without believing in and accepting the love of God we will fall short of the fullness of love for others.

The importance of love

The measure of our love for others reveals the measure of our love for God. “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20)

Jesus tells us in Matthew 25:37-40 whatever we do for others we do for Him and whatever we do not do for others we do not do for Him. Seeing Jesus in others can be difficult at times, especially when they live an unholy life or have hurt us. But Jesus didn’t sacrifice His life only for those who love Him and follow Him. His sacrifice was not conditional. We too must not make love conditional. When we fail to love others, we fail to love God. Just as some reject the love of God that comes from the cross, some will also reject the love of God that comes from us. This doesn’t take away God’s love. In like manner, we too must not withhold God’s love for others because we have been hurt or rejected.

Christians are called to evangelize and bring others to God’s love. But if evangelization is not done in love, evangelization will not be effective. Works of love and living a life in accord with God’s word have far greater impact on evangelization than preaching and condemning. In fact, if we don’t approach others in love, we can cause more harm than good. "Believers can have more than a little to do with the rise of atheism. To the extent that they are careless about their instruction in the faith, or present its teaching falsely, or even fail in their religious, moral, or social life, they must be said to conceal rather than to reveal the true nature of God and of religion"  (Catechism, 2125). (See my article Christians Contributing to Atheism.)

A story of God’s love

As I walked down the street, returning to work from lunch, a woman asked if I could help her by giving her a little money. Her story was that she was trying to get enough money to buy a train ticket so she could get to her daughter who had a desperate need. I decided to put her to the test.

I told her, “I don’t usually hand out money. But, the train station is two blocks from here and if you really want to go to your daughter I’ll buy the ticket.”

To my amazement, she jumped up and with much excitement began walking to the station.

As we walked, she began sharing about herself and talked about the situation. At one point, she said “It’s difficult to get help sometimes when people find out I’m a lesbian.”

Now, I had to think. Was she (or God) putting me to the test? Would I still help her even though she was living a sinful lifestyle? My thoughts turned to “whatsoever you do.” I thought, Jesus didn’t say whatsoever you do for Christians who are sinless. Led by the Spirit of God’s love and ignoring any personal feelings I have about that lifestyle, I walked on.

As we entered the station, some of the people there seemed to know her. They asked how she was coming along with money for the ticket and she told everyone I was buying the ticket so she could finally go to her daughter.

When I handed her the ticket, she gave me a big hug and said, “Thank you and God bless you.” It was an awkward moment for me, being the first time I know of being hugged by a child of God who was a lesbian.

I finished my walk back to work, not so much pleased with my charity as pondering what all this meant in relation to God’s love. I thought about how God still sees her as His child in need, despite any sins. I thought about how God sees me as His child in need, despite my sins. I thought about how God blessed both of us through each other. God is good.

Conclusion

If we don’t love others as God loves us, we are nothing. Without love, our prayers to God sound only like a gong or clashing cymbal (1 Corinthians 13:1-2). Sometimes, when we wonder why God doesn’t “hear our prayer”, maybe our prayer is only a clashing cymbal to Him because we do not love. Unanswered prayer might not always be God’s fault.

Not all who cry out “Lord, Lord” will enter the Kingdom of God (Matthew 7:21). If we want to enter the Kingdom of God without a layover in Purgatory, we have to be more than just followers of Jesus. We have to be disciples and love others as Jesus loves us.

This article is available for free download at Catholic Paths.