(God's) Love is not (only) objective?

If love is not objective, does that mean it is subjective? What is love?

Blake

dorcas wrote:

I hope other questions will spring naturally from considering this.

Love is [i][b]not[/b][/i] objective?

In the words of Pauline Hanson, "Please explain (pronounced 'exploin')?"
(Aussie joke, but serious question).

Love is Submissive... and as we All know love is patient, and kind it does not take into accout any wrong doings, it forgives and it gives, and it gives, and it gives.

What do you mean by objective?

I believe that love is wanting to get to know someone, without judging them. It's being sensative enough to know and discern certain concerns. It's to weep with those who weep, and to rejoice with those who rejoice.

What is Love? This is what my bible says;

LOVE, we may have given up on love. Perhaps we have waited for love to find us, only to be disappointed. Maybe our loved ones have hurt us so badily that we needed to numb ourself from the pain. In the past. It is God's will that we love others; without love nothing else matters 1 Corn 13:1-3 -- Love is more that a feeling, YES IT IS, it is choosing to behave in loving ways. It is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, produced in our life as we yield to God. Amen The bible defines it this way: "Love is patient and kind." " Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude" "Love never gives up!" " Love never loses faith", "Love is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance".

No one loves perfectly, but we must learn how to love. We can ask God to help us love others and stop waiting fro them to love us. We cannot expect to be good at loving right away; we should be patient as God's love grows within us and he teaches us how to love. When we choose to act in loving ways, the emtions will follow, and we will find that our love will be returned.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

4Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily.

5It is not conceited (arrogant and inflated with pride); it is not rude (unmannerly) and does not act unbecomingly. Love (God's love in us) does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it [it pays no attention to a suffered wrong].

6It does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but rejoices when right and truth prevail.

7Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything [without weakening].

8Love never fails [never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end]. As for prophecy ([d]the gift of interpreting the divine will and purpose), it will be fulfilled and pass away; as for tongues, they will be destroyed and cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [it will lose its value and be superseded by truth].

Quote:

I hope other questions will spring naturally from considering this.

Thanks Dorcas for beginning this thread.

It seems that the more we speak about Love, the more we desire to disect God's word and begin to share through out Scripture what LOVE is, what LOVE means to us personally, and What LOVE meant to God.

John 3:16, For God so LOVED the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life.

LOVE IS SACRIFICIAL, it sacrifices it is always willing to go above and beyond. Without expecting anything in return, knowing that what you do you do it as unto the Lord.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

4Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily.

5It is not conceited (arrogant and inflated with pride); it is not rude (unmannerly) and does not act unbecomingly. Love (God's love in us) does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it [it pays no attention to a suffered wrong].

6It does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but rejoices when right and truth prevail.

7Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything [without weakening].

8Love never fails [never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end]. As for prophecy ([d]the gift of interpreting the divine will and purpose), it will be fulfilled and pass away; as for tongues, they will be destroyed and cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [it will lose its value and be superseded by truth

Amen.......this is where I turn everytime I need to remind myself of what Love truly is. What GOD says love is does not appear to me to be based on conditions, but ever hopeful inspite of the conditions. Blessings in Him, Cindy

Dictionary definitions:

Objective
Uninfluenced by emotions or personal prejudices: an objective critic.
Based on observable phenomena; presented factually: an objective appraisal.
Indicating a symptom or condition perceived as a sign of disease by someone other than the person affected.
independent of individual thought, and perceptible by all observers
perceptible to persons other than the affected individual

Subjective:
Proceeding from or taking place in a person's mind rather than the external world: a subjective decision.
Particular to a given person; personal: subjective experience.
Illusory. Existing only within the experiencer's mind.
Of, relating to, or designating a symptom or condition perceived by the patient and not by the examiner.

In view of these definitions, we would have to say that love is both. God’s love infiltrates the entire human race. Many do not believe in God's love, and for them it is neither a subjective reality nor an objective reality.

Love is objective. IT is real. It is a fact. God is love. However, without subjective awareness, or without accepting its reality one remains in denial.

Those who do not have a subjective encounter with God’s love will not be inclined to put their trust in him, or accept his mercy and forgiveness.

Love must be much more than an objective, doctrinal truth. It must be a subjective experience/reality in order for one to live a godly life that pleases God.

Yes, love is objective! If it wasn’t, it would only be an illusion. And trusting in an illusion is false trust.

As YeshuaIsMyGod posted:

1 John 4:19
We love, because He first loved us.

Does that make sense?
Diane

To do that, His love had to be totally subjective.

Of course, that does not in any way exclude the objective FACT of Love. Love is also objective - apart from subjective experience. I press this point to bash at the belief that God is whatever you experience him to be. .. the "higher power" philosophy, where you make up your own reality, and that YOUR truth.
Diane

If Love is submissive and submission can only be between equals, what does that say about the type of Love you allude to? .... and how do we arrive at it?

Worldly thinking tends to use and define the word as the relationship of a subordinate to a superior, but that is not what Jesus taught about submission. He taught us to give up our rights: our rightful places of position, our rightful belongings, or what is rightfully owed to us, for the benefit of others - regardless of how they are positioned on the heirarchal structure. That IS love.

Jesus set the example by surrendering his rightful place of divine authority and power to submit to mankind. That is love. Jesus taught his followers to wash dirty feet. That is submission. That is love - it has nothing to do with hierarchal structures.

A good example is a mother who gets up in the night to feed her crying newborn. Mom submits to junior out of love. She sacrificially gives up her right to sleep in order to meet a need of her subordinate.

So, we can say, love is always submissive. But submission is not always love. One can surrender their rights to a selfish superior power out of fear or desire to avoid flack or rejection. That is NOT loving submission. That does not help the selfish person(s) grow into maturity. Jesus never submitted to anyone's selfish desires. And we are commanded to do likewise.

Do those thoughts bring clarification?

Diane

There was a time that God spoke to me about love and for myself it was a revelation. I knew that the fulfillment of God's commandments was love. We are to love Him with all of our heart, all of our strength, all of our mind, and all of our soul, and the second commandment as given by Jesus in His Reader's Digest condensed version of the whole Law and the Prophets, was to love our neighbour as ourselves. I thought it therefore important that I should understand what love was. The first thing that He taughht me was that love is a choice. It is not based on our emotions though we sometimes would interpret whether we love or not by our emotions. That is not to belittle our emotions. But He taught me that despite my feelings I needed to choose to spend time with Him. It was in the use of my freewill that I would express my love toward Him. It took me a while before I realized that I could use the same principles toward others. Just a slow learner I guess. When things are going well it is easy to love someone. It is also easy to study God's Word and to pray when we are feeling near to Him. But we must choose to pray and choose to spend time with Him when we are less than excited. Choosing and doing the right thing to do when it flies in the face of our emotions is an expression of true love. Its easy to love one who loves us but what to do to love that one who hurts us. If we depend on our emotions we will be no different than the rest of the world. We will likely respond just as the world does by returning evil for evil and excuse ourselves by saying that we are not perfect. No, we must choose the right way in these times. Sometimes love is easy, sometimes it is very difficult. But to sum it all up, love is a choice that we make and whether it is an easy choice or a difficult choice depends on the circumstances. Love is not based on our emotions and sometimes is carried out despite our emotions. We say that we fall out of love and it happens everyday in relationships and marriages but all that we are really saying is that we no longer feel the emotion that we first felt. Welcome to the human race. It happens to all. True love is not merely our emotion, it is not merely subjective, it is according to our freewill that we choose to love or choose not to love. God chooses to love us despite how we might treat Him. We are called to the same.