Love

Nothing is, perhaps, more difficult to define than love. We know that God is love because He sent His Son to die for our sins when we were as deeply in love with the darkness as He was with the world. But knowing that God is love only reminds me of how far I must be from knowing how to love. I am immeasurably short of being like God--though hopefully through His Spirit, I am making some progress in the transformation process into His image. Prayerfully, I am in some small way a reflection of His love. But I have farther to go than I could ever imagine.
One of the things that makes love so difficult to define is its many variations. There is a parent's love for his or her child. There is a child's love toward his parents. There is a friend's love for his friend. There is the love between a man and a woman as they try to discover how deeply they desire to commit to loving one another. There is a husband's love for his wife, a wife's love for her husband. And I'm sure you could think of other kinds of love--a grandparent's love, a teacher's love, a brother and sister's love, perhaps the list is endless.
How then can we define it, or at least, understand how to love? Well, on several occasions Jesus said "greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friend." That's why God's love is so unfathomable to us. He lay down His life for His enemies. And we hadn't even asked Him to; in fact, we killed Him. But just what is implied by "laying down one's life"? First, love neither expects nor anticipates anything in return. We must not love in order to be loved back. We must not fall in love with being loved but in giving love.
And it must encompass all that we are: body, soul, and spirit. And John even tells us in his first epistles that it must include our stuff. The things that make up our life we must willingly lay down to demonstrate God's love to others. In that way we can be rich toward God.
And, obviously, the laying down of my life requires a sacrifice. As I die to self-love, as I sacrifice myself for others, I am empowered to begin to love as Christ loves. Remember, He came not to be served but to serve. He came because He first loved us; He came to willingly sacrifice Himself for us.
And, remarkably, God has called on us--His disciples--to a love like His. He has called us to a greater love than the greatest human love. He has called us to love our enemies. When we lay down our lives for our friends and family, we've only just begun to love as He loves. For how many of those we disagree with, say, in the political arena, for example, have ever once been recipients of our love? Do they even suspect that we love them? And love is not demonstrated by words alone, but by deeds.
Love. I have so far to go in order to love as He loved me--loves me. I have not even begun to scratch the surface of loving my friends enough to lay down my life for them. I doubt if those with whom I disagree are confident that I love them. And yet, God has called me to make His love a reality in the world in which I live. Let us submit to His Spirit that the world in which we live may be unable to deny that "God so loved the world."