Specific Love

St. Paul writing to his apprentice Timothy says this about their ministry:

“The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.”

Plain as day, we are meant to love people as Christ has loved us. But love is a specific thing in the Bible, it is not some ambiguous notion that has to do with good feelings. We say this word “love” all the time and yet have trouble understanding it. Paul specifies: our love comes from a heart and a conscience that are both pure and good along with a faith that is honest. We are commanded to love, but love out of something, out of an abundance of love, out of a changed heart, out of a clear mind, out of a hope in God.

Love is not ambiguous, it is specific: “By this we know what love is,” St. John writes, “that Jesus Christ laid his life down for us and we ought to do the same for our brothers and sisters.” Love is not contrived or thought up and checked off the religious to-do list, love is an outpouring - so what is filling you up?   

The Christian life operates so well this way because our well, our resource, our center is not an argument or doctrine, but a person. It is founded on a man who lived perfectly and died forgiving people who hated him. Our well is deep and our love is specifically self-sacrificing and generous.

Paul continues writing to his protege saying, “Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussions…” 

When we fix our eyes on “being right” instead of God making us right, we miss the gospel and get trapped into religious fundamentalism. But fundamentalism is not bad if our fundamental becomes the man Jesus. When our fundamental becomes the manifested love of Jesus who died for his enemies, our lives change and we love out of a clean heart, clear mind, and an honest hope in something much greater than ourselves.