What is Love, After All?

Not long ago, some friends invited us to attend a marriage class offered at another church.  Structurally, the class is similar to Celebrate Recovery with closed small groups and the desire for honest communication.  The class was fun, and we enjoyed it.   

The first lesson was titled “Love.” As we worked through the meaning of love described in 1 Corinthians 13, love was presented as the choices we make. Although I have taught it this way myself for quite a while, the concept sat ‘funny’ on me this time.  I decided to take a deeper dive into the language and accept help from some commentaries I have on hand.   

So, what is love? 

The Greek word in 1 Corinthians is “agape,” which indicates God’s love.  That is important to remember going forward.  But I also found that there is inconsistency in translation that I had never seen before.  English translations of 1 Corinthians 13:4-6 generally read as follows: love is patient, love is kind, love does not envy, love does not boast, etc.  In our translations, the word “love” is followed by phrases which use either is or does.  But in the original Greek, “is” and “does” are not present. Instead, the verb love is followed by another 15 verbs pilled together.  While this is unmanageable in English grammar, something a bit closer using adjectives instead of verbs might look like this: 

Love patiently, kindly, not enviously, not boastfully, not arrogantly, not selfishly, not irritably, not resentfully, etc. 

What difference does this make?  For background, the Corinthian church was not known as a healthy church.  They had showy and self-centered spiritual lives.  The sins present in Corinth are brutally obvious to Paul and to us, but oddly were not recognized by the church at Corinth.  Paul recognizes that the real issue is not the good works they performed, their wisdom, or their passion.  The problem was that they were done without the foundation of love; that is, love shown in loving actions. What then is love?  Gordon Fee* explains: 

“...because of the lyrical nature of [1 Corinthians 13:1-7], it is easy to think that love is an abstract quality.  This is precisely to miss Paul’s concern.  Love is primary for him because it has already been given concrete expression in the coming of Jesus Christ to die for the sins of the world.  Love is not an idea for Paul, not even a ‘motivating factor’ for behavior.  It is behavior. [emphasis added] To love is to act; anything short of action is not love at all.”  

Do you see why this is an important distinction?   

Love is not abstract; it is behavior.  It is not some hazy way you feel.  It is not thinking about people in a certain way. It is treating them as they deserve to be treated as beings made in the image of God.  Paul hammers this home with the 15 action verbs which follow the initial verb, love. 

Several years ago, Bob Goff produced a best-selling book called Love Does**.  If you read it, you probably remember it for the fabulous humor.  But humor was merely a vehicle to get across the key point of 1 Corinthians 13.  Love does.  And Bob illustrates this inhis book with chapters which show love in action.   

Love is to act, and not anything less.   

*Gordon Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, Eerdmans, 1987, p. 628. 

**Bob Goff, Love Does, Thomas Nelson, 2012.