LOVE IS THE GOLD STANDARD OF CHRISTIANITY  

Love is the gold standard of Christianity against which all things are measured.

Love, however, is more than an emotion. It is not merely a feeling. Love has two components that can be measured. To measure love, data from the answers to two questions are needed.

  1. What is the scope of our love? and

  2. What is the size of our payment? .

We approach perfection in love as the scope of our love broadens and the size of our love grows. 

1) What is the scope of our love? In other words, whom do we love? Is the scope of our love narrow or broad? Whom do we include in and whom do we exclude from the scope of our love?

2) What is the size of our payment? Love is not free. It comes at a cost. Love requires the payment of a ransom in return for the giving of a blessing or the lifting of a burden. Are we willing to pay the cost of love? Furthermore, how much are we willing to pay? Is the amount we are willing to pay small or large? Are we generous or parsimonious with our payment?

There is a difference between selfish love and sacrificial love. Selfish love picks up the tab for ourselves. Sacrificial love picks up the tab for others. Sacrificial love is a willingness to pay out of our own pockets the costs for the production of benefits to or the removal of burdens from our neighbors.

Initially, both the scope of our love and the size of our love are stunted. We begin at absolute selfishness.

God, however, endowed reality with naturally occurring structures that encourage us to expand the scope and the size of our love. They are a hospitable environment where love can prosper. Naturally occurring love expanding structures are designed to be places where a reciprocity of love is experienced. In these structures, love is a two way street. Examples are family, friendship, marriage, team, club, tribe and Church. The relationship of a mother and her child is a naturally occurring love expanding structure. God’s enemies seek to eradicate the structures to deprive us of the joy of reciprocating love. By experiencing a reciprocity of love in these and other love expanding structures, we learn to perfect our love. Love begets love. The business of Christianity is seminal. Christianity plants the seeds of sacrificial love (Matthew 13:31-32) into the soil of the hearts (Luke 17:20-21) of the children of Adam and Eve. The seeds turn into trees so that, in the orchards of Christianity - the gardens of the new Eden -, many can enjoy the fruits of sacrificial love (Mark 4:20).

The good Samaritan is celebrated for radicalizing the scope of his love. He picked up the tab for a stranger in distress. Including a stranger within the scope of love was unprecedented. The expansion of the scope of love by the good Samaritan was a breakthrough in the science of love. When it was Jesus's turn to advance the science of love, Jesus pushed the envelope. Jesus raised the bar that marks the upper limit of love far higher than the Good Samaritan did (Luke 10:25-37). Jesus radicalized both the size of his love and the scope of his love.

With regard to the size of his love, Jesus laid down his life for us (John 10:15-18) (John 15:13). He made the payment not from his unlimited divine resources. He made the payment from his limited human resources. He paid them all for us (1 Corinthians 7:23-24). He kept not a penny for himself. He has never paid more for anything else (John 15:13). The exorbitant size of the payment is irrefutable evidence of the exorbitant size of his love for us.

With regard to the scope of his love, it was said that “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13.) This, however, was merely the conventional wisdom. Jesus destroyed the conventional wisdom. He obliterated it. He turned conventional wisdom on its head. Jesus showed us a love that was more radical - more extreme - than laying down one's life for our friends. How so? Jesus radicalized the scope of his love. Jesus laid down his life not for his friends but for his enemies. Jesus picked up the tab for us, the very sinners who tortured and murdered him (Romans 5:8) (Matthew 7:6) (Luke 23:34). Because his most sacred heart stayed filled to the brim with love for us, Jesus was able to say "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). Wow! How radical is such love! How extreme! Is no one, not even his enemies, excluded from the scope of his love? 

In the toxic soil of the Crucifixion, we planted Jesus. And the glorious flower of the Resurrection bloomed. We tortured and killed him. He suffered and died. Yet, he did not stay dead and he did not stop loving us. He arose from the dead still alive and still in love with us. That he emerged from the dead still alive is the indisputable proof of his power. Nobody emerges from the dead. He did. That he emerged from the dead still in love with us is the indisputable proof that our conception of divinity as power is incomplete. Divinity is also love - a mysteriously intransigent, inexplicably persistent and radically stubborn love (Isaiah 55:8-9) (Psalm 8:4-8).  

Take stock of yourself. What is the scope and size of your love? How much are you willing to pay from your own pocket? For whom?

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