“LOVE IS LOVE”: WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?

Have you seen the slogan “love is love”? It appears on the lawn signs and T-shirts of those who advocate for LGBTQIA+ concerns, and it’s meant to promote a modern and tolerant approach to sexual morality. But the slogan itself destroys love. It’s non-defining of love goes to the heart of the problem with modern sexual morality.

I’ll give you and example. Multi-partner marriages were first made legal in Summerville, Massachusetts in 2020. (Though in their moral prudery they limited the number of partners to six). Similar protections are now afforded in Cambridge, Arlington, and in Berkely California. So “love” no longer need be monogamous. Is this an enlightened approach to marriage? No, just the opposite: it destroys marriage.

Or consider another venue: spend a day in a busy therapy practice and observe the clientele. You’ll meet women with “husbands” that are transgendered, de-transitioners, teens experimenting with every kind of sex – and of course, heterosexuals living together outside of marriage.

This is what “love is love” gets us: a moral free-for-all and sad ignorance of God’s gift of true love. Love becomes defined by feelings and hormones and the sexual imagery of Hollywood and professional hucksters of Madison Avenue advertising. Is anyone gut-punched by the blindness and inevitable self-centeredness of “love is love”?

John, nick-named “the apostle of love”, defines love for us: By this we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us (1 John 3:16). Love, he says, is about self-sacrifice and self-transcendence. But our culture believes love is about self-fulfillment.

This is nothing new. Our fallen race has been making this mistake for quite some time now. And yes, it is difficult for us self-centered creatures to understand true love. Really, it’s only possible if we are Spirit-filled. It’s only possible when we gaze upon the cross of Jesus and behold the purity of his love.

But it is possible! For followers of Christ, it happens all the time.

So listen: be the minority! Be the sane voice! Be the lover among the lost. Be the one who fights the flesh and wins. Be the one who denies self and discovers heaven. This is beautiful victory. And one day, when his kingdom comes in full, you will see something with utter clarity and joy: that the love you gave yourself for on earth was worth every sacrifice, every snub, every disappointment, and every ache. You will stand in the winner’s circle, and you will be healed of every hurt. And perfect love will not only be in you, it will be all around you, forever.