Valentine’s Day: Flawed Love

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast, making Theology Central. Good morning everyone. It is Friday, February the fourteenth, twenty twenty five. It is currently eleven twenty three am Central Time, and I am coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. Now I have to stress I'm coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio. The name of this podcast is Theology Central because we are about to talk about something from a philological perspective and a lot of people are not going to like it.

0:50 But we're going to talk about this from a theological perspective. We're going to talk about it from a perspective that I think conforms to reality, not to maybe our ideal, our romanticized idea of something. But we're going to talk about it from a brutally honest, realistic, and philological perspective. And I doubt it's going to make anyone happy, but we have to do it. Now. It's February the fourteenth, It's Valentine's Day, right. Love is in the air. Right. If you look on some of your music streaming services right now, they have all kinds of playlists dedicated to love, dedicated to romance. Now they also have a lot of playlists dedicated to heartbreak and loneliness and isolation and pain and discouragement, because well, Valentine's Day brings in lots of different emotions for lots of different people. But it's Valentine's Day, that day that we're supposed to celebrate love and romance and all of these types of things. And look, you, maybe I don't care if it's Valentine's Day. You may disregard, you may not care, but just consider this. In twenty twenty five, this year, are you ready for this Valentine's Day?

2:12 Spending in the United States of America is going to reach a record of twenty seven point five billion dollars. Twenty seven point five billion dollars is going to be spent on this Valentine's Day. For February the fourteenth, twenty twenty five, The average consumer is planning to spend approximately one hundred and eighty eight dollars and eighty one cents. This marks an increase from twenty five point eight billion spent in twenty twenty four. The most popular expenditures will include jewelry and evening out, candy, flowers and greeting cards.

3:05 And for many because this Valentine's Day falls on a Friday, so you have the weekend. Well it may be a romantic weekend away, so there's going to be lots of money spent. Now, most of this money spent on Valentine's Day is indeed, I think this is important. It is directed towards celebrating love. I think that I think we can agree with that. To celebrate romance or it's the pursuit of love and romance, people will buy gifts like jewelry, flowers, candy, and greeting cards to express love and affection to their partners, family and friends. Romantic dinners, romantic trips and other experiences also account for a significant portion of the spending that's celebrating relationships or even seeking new romantic connections. I watch it just twenty seven point five billion dollars to celebrate love, to experience it, to pursue it, to capture it, to re ignite it. It's all going to be happening. Well, it's it's already Valentine's Day, so it may have already started.

4:26 It'll be definitely kicking into high gear this evening and throughout the weekend. It's Valentine's Day. And don't think the church is, you know somehow just like well, that's what the world does, and the church doesn't pay any attention to it. Oh No, even yesterday our daily bread a devotional. It comes in printed form, but there's also the podcast. It's about a five to ten minute a devotional. Well, they always dropped the next day's devotional the previous day, and so I saw the notification, hit play on it for you know, about two or three minutes. And guess what it was about. It was about love. If you look on the sermon's two point oh app and you look at the trending hashtags for today, guess what one of the trending hashtags is for today. It's on love.

5:12 If you look on all the streaming services music services, love playlist are all over the place. I think serious exim even I just sent out a notification. Maybe it was earlier this morning about the Love Channel and different channels dedicated to love. If you look on some of the streaming services for movies and television shows, romantic comedies are being pushed to the forefront because it's all about love. Now. I think that when we start thinking about this, we have to think about this, you know, from a maybe maybe from slightly a different perspective. But I think we should do this. I think this is fair because I don't want to go immediately, because I'm going to approach this from a way that again a lot. I've already tried to make it clear from a philological perspective, from a brutally honest perspective, and I know that's going to sound it's going to sound very negative, but let's at least do this. If we think of human beings, we have this ideal of love, We have this concept of what it should be, and we have maybe feelings, maybe dreams, maybe fantasies of what it should be, what it could be, what we want it to be. Right, if you think

6:44 of humanity's ideal of love, I think we can agree with this that when it comes to human beings for the most part. Now there's always exceptions, but I think in general humans, when we think of love, we think of emotional connection. Love is typically seen as this deep emotional bond that brings happiness, It brings comfort, it brings belonging. Right, there has to be this sense of strong emotional connection. I think that that's our ideal of what it should be, of what it is. I think we can agree that at least to some level. Right, Not only is there this ideal that our ideal, our our ideal understanding, our ideal concept of love involves an emotional connection. I think we can agree with them. Another part of our ideal, you know, concept of love, would be romantic fulfillment. Especially within popular culture, it betrays love is passionate, exhilarating, fulfilling, often centered on romance, attraction, and intimacy. I think we we can definitely agree with that. Now they're there, we can get into I mean, we could really try to break this all down, but I think there's no way to get around that. At least the ideal of love involves emotional connection and romantic fulfillment. I think number three

8:18 mutual support for us as humans, ideal love includes loyalty, trust, unwavering support through life's challenges, the idea that hey, someone's gonna support me. They're gonna be there, they're gonna they're gonna they're gonna support what I'm doing, encouraging it being a part of it. I think those I think those three things, I think that's accurate. I don't think that's being I think that's trying to be fair. That are we have this ideal of love that involves emotional connection, romantic fulfillment, and mutual support. I think this is another part. I think we can agree with this. You can, you can tell me if you disagree, but I think we can mostly agree with this, that our ideal of love involves self lessness and sacrifice. Love is typically in our in our minds, seen as this self giving where we prioritize another's well being even at our own personal cost.

9:25 Now that's the ideal. It's selfless, it's not selfish, it's selfless, and it's sacrifice. And you care more about the other person than you care about yourself. This is the ideal idea of love. This is what we This is what we want it to be. This maybe how it shows up and music and movies and poetry and and and novels and and this is the way we have this kind of almost a romanticized idea of what it should be. It involves emotional connection, it involves romantic fulfillment, It involves mutual support. It is selfless and sacrificial. Number five. I think our ideal concept of love also has this idea of unconditional acceptance. I think we often envision love as accepting and cherishing someone despot despite their flaws and failures.

10:27 I think that that's fair right that our concept of love, our idea of love, is that we we envision that love accepts and cherishes someone despite flaws and failures. I think number six, we also are ideal concept of love. Would it would would would talk about security and stability. See, love is seen as a safe haven. It provides emotional and relational security that there's a security there, there's a stability there, there's a safety there. You can feel safe, and by feeling safe, you can feel free. That this is our what we want it to be. So our humanity's ideal of love is emotional connection, romantic fulfillment, mutual support, self lessness and being sacrificial, unconditional acceptance, some sense of security and stability. Number seven. Enduring commitment. Enduring commitment the ideal love. It lasts through well time, It goes through trials, it goes through challenges, it goes through changes, and it remains steadfast. It endures at lasts. It doesn't fluctuate, it doesn't fall apart, it doesn't it stays. It endures because

12:01 it's love. Right. Love is different than like. Love is different than oh you're cool, or that's interesting, or that's fun or oh wow, that's exciting. It's something deeper. That's the way we understand it to be. We I mean, the love the word we know, at least to some level, we think that's got to be saved for something. Now, sometimes we use it in obviously for everything. I love this food, I love this I love this weather. But when it comes to people, typically we feel that it's got to be guarded a little bit because it means something deeper. It's this enduring commitment. How about it also involves personal growth and fulfillment. Love is often viewed as a source of personal development, bringing out the best in each other and providing purpose. So humanity's ideal love is emotional connection, romantic fulfillment, mutual support, selflessness and sacrificial unconditional acceptance, security and stability, enduring commitment, personal growth, and fulfillment. I think that that captures are ideal of love. And you can hear that ideal. I mean, just go I mean,

13:31 if you have SERIOUSXM, go listen to the Love channel today, whatever music streaming service, go look up love playlist. You're gonna hear these ideals expressed over and over and over and over and just I mean, obviously the subject has captured popular music. If you go back just to nineteen fifty to twenty twenty five, you have hundreds and hundreds of thousands of songs written to describe one of those aspects of love. You have. Think of all the poetry that has been written love, love, love, love love. It's I mean billions of dollars spent to supposedly celebrate this ideal of love. See. I think Valentine's Day is more about celebrating the ideal than maybe the reality. So as we're sitting there listening, thinking, feeling, hoping, wanting this ideal, celebrating it, pursuing it, looking for it, searching it, cherishing it, treasuring it, protecting it, well, whatever we are in that whole concept, I think we need kind of a reality check. Now.

14:41 Those ideals may reflect our highest aspiration, it may reflect our highest desire for this kind of love, but I would argue, real life, real life, turn off the hall turn off the television, turn off the movies, turn off the music, turn put down the novel, look at life. In reality, there's typically a grand Canyon chasm, this immense chasm, this gap between our ideal and the reality of what it is. And I think this is due to human beings, limitations, human beings self interest, and human beings in perfection. So I'm going to put forth my very very very very very very very very very non Valentine's Day hypotheses love. Now, you're not gonna hear this in church. You're not gonna hear this in chapel service. You're not gonna hear this in small group. You're not gonna hear this in Bible study.

16:11 You're not gonna hear this in any other Christian podcast. Because I'm about to just say that entire ideal of love is completely fraudulent. It is fake. It is a mirage. It is a lie. It is you chase it, you think you oh, I found this oasis, and you jump and boom, it's nothing but well dirt. It's a mirage. It's not really there. It's fraudulent. It's fake. Now, I love that we have these aspirations. I love that our emotions and feelings can maybe even convince us of it there.

16:52 But I think the reality is unless you unless you can enter into a new universe, unless you can enter into another world, unless there's a doorway there that you can open and walk through on the other side of the door. For most people, no, no, no, that doesn't exist. There's a reality. So here's my hypothesis on human love and self interest. Here's my core premise, here's my basic way of explaining it. I believe human love is inherently selfish. I believe human love is inherently driven by self interest, and that human love is driven by self preservation rather than self lessness. I believe human love is selfish. It is self self interest, focused on self interest. It is self It preserves self. It is not self less. It is selfish by definition. I think the essence of human love is self interest. I think that's what it is.

17:59 It is about the ex of self. It is about what you can get. It's selfish, selfish, selfish, selfish, selfish, selfish, selfish, and that comes to our love for others, and that comes to our love for God. It is self centered, self focused, self pursuing what you truly you may say you love God, you may say you love someone else, you love your self. Now, I told you, I'm looking at this from a theological perspective. I know this is ruining Valentine's Day for some of you. I know someone from the other rooms like, turn that trash off. We have Valentine's Day. We're gonna celebrate love. Why are you listening to that? Idiot? And I can understand. It destroys the what we want it to be. Look, we can all want something, we can all pursue something, we can all dream of it, we can all think. But at some point from at least when we turn on a podcast called Theology Central, we have to go okay, okay, let's look at it from a philological and a I think reality based perspective. I think my core premise is that human love is inherently selfish. It is driven by self interest and self preservation, and it is selfish. It is not self less. That's my core promise. Let's consider human love for others. Love is motivated by what we can gain from others. You love because what you perceive

19:31 you can obtain. You you love because of what you perceive you can gain. You love because of what you perceive that you can that you can get all right? That that that's I cannot stress this enough. Our love at its very core now I know you people are going to try to push back on this, but at its very core, at its very essence, we love others because we perceive what what, what it makes makes us feel, what we can obtain, what we can get. You don't love that if you perceive there is nothing in return. Right, You don't love unless you are feeling something and those feelings are. You don't love because you have negative feelings.

20:21 You have love because positive feelings. You don't love because you're going to receive something negative in return. It's because you perceive you're going to get something positive in return. Love is motivated by what we can gain from others, like, for example, emotional fulfillment, security, pleasure, validation, companionship, social benefits. We love others because we gain emotional fulfillment, security, pleasure, validation, companionship, and social benefits. We can't deny that we love in order to get So do we really love them or do we love what we get from them? Meaning that we love ourselves. I'm loving you because of what you provide.

21:16 For me? What do you provide for me? Emotional fulfillment, security, pleasure, validation, companionship, encouragement, partner, all those types of things. Even what appears to be selfless acts of love often have underlining motives related to personal satisfaction, avoidance of loneliness, or the desire well for something to receive something in return. Even our selfless acts have underlining motives related to personal satisfaction. You want to avoid being lonely, or the desire just to get something back.

22:20 You're looking for something, You're looking for something, You're looking for something. Now, I really want you to think about this. I know this is not the typical Valentine's Day discussion, but I just want you to see at the core, I want you to see how motivated you are in everything you do by your own self interest. I want you to consider your interactions, your your actions and how, and I want you to get what do you get versus what the other gets? Time and time again, when we look at there's a typically a lot of times there's an imbalance. We're getting far more than we're giving.

23:12 And trust me, we're very concerned about that and balance. So my core premise is that human love is inherently selfish, driven by self interest and self preservation rather than selflessness. That human love and human love for others is motivated by what we can gain emotional fulfillment, security, those tough things. Even our selfless acts of love have underlining motives of selfishness. How about our love for God? I think our love for God is tainted by self interest, rooted in the pursuit of eternal security, blessings, forgiveness, purpose, comfort, and community. Even when we love God, it's tainted by self interest.

23:54 I love God because of what I get from it. Here's a here's a million dollar question. Here, here's a Here's here's I think the the key question when it comes to our love for God. Are you ready here here's the key question. I want you to really think about this. Would you, as an individual still love God if there was no promise of heaven, no promise of avoiding hell? Would you still love God? If there's no promise of heaven and no promise of avoiding hell, You're you're you're gonna love God, but you are still going to burn for eternity? Would you still love him? Now?

24:47 We have a hard enough time loving God, just when things in our life don't go the way we want him to go. Right, It's easy to love God when you've got your spouse and you've got companionship, and you've got intimacy, and you've got your family, and you've got your home, and everything is wonderful, and you've got everything's great, and you've got companionship. You're not alone everything, you don't have any disease everything. Now wait, just now, that stuff start being stripped away, peace by peace, People get diseases, people start dying, people leave you. You find yourself alone. You have no intimacy, you have no you have no pleasure, you have no companionship, you have no partner, you have nothing.

25:34 You're just alone. Now you may say, Hey, God, I don't know if I love you so much right now, because I don't really understand what you're doing. Why, Because our love is so much tied into what we receive. Would you come on, just be honest, would you love God if there was no promise of heaven and no promise of avoidance of hell. I think the implication then, is that much of our human devotion, much of our devotion to God, is driven by what is gained from the relationship rather than pure love for him. I will say no human has pure love for anyone else other than itself, and no human has any pure love for God.

26:25 The only pure love that exists is our love for ourselves. We love ourselves now sometimes maybe because we can be caught up in some things, we may have some hate or loathe for ourselves. But even sometimes that hating and loathing ourselves, it's still wrapped up in self focused self interest. Me me, me, me, me me. So my hypothesis is, my core premise is that human love is inherently selfish, is driven by self interest and self preservation rather than rather than selflessness. It is selfish. Human love for others, I believe is motivated by what we can gain from others, like emotional fulfillment, security, pleasure, validation, companionship, partnership, encouragement, et cetera.

27:09 So I could just I can keep adding to the list over and over and over. I believe our even our selfless acts of love or have underlying motives that reveal well, not selfless but selfish A human are human, uh are our human love for God? We stay it that way. The third so number one our court my core premise number two are human love for others. Number three are human love for God. I believe is again and tainted by self interest. Now, what is the theological foundation for my hypotheses? What is my theological foundation? Well, I believe that my view aligns with the doctrine of human depravity, because I believe this doctrine asserts that every aspect of human nature, including love, is corrupted by sin.

27:56 I believe, I believe from a thiological perspect if you believe in human depravity, you have to agree with my hypothesis. I know it may ruin your Valentine's evening. I may know it may ruin the rom com you're gonna watch her, or your love playlists that you're listening to today, but I'm sorry. From a philological perspective, human depravity touches every aspect of us, which of course would include love. Our love is corrupted, Our love is sick, our love is flawed, our love is broken at its very essence. Even the highest forms of human love falls short of the Biblical standard.

28:49 That's the key. Even the highest form of human love, even the highest and we love to find these examples of where humans are doing this, and humans are doing that ooh, that's example of love from a biblical standard. It falls short because and this makes the doctrine of imputed righteousness essential, because human love is insufficient and flawed. Our human love is flawed at its very essence. No matter what examples you put forth, No matter what examples you put forth, I'm sorry they are from a biblical standard. It is flawed because a biblical standard of love has to be pure, it has to be perfect. Ours is inherently flawed. To some love. We may not be able to perceive the corruption. We may not be able to see it, maybe we don't want to see it, but it's there. So my hypothesis is, my core premise, is that human love is inherently selfish. That human love for others selfish, it's motivated by what we can gain. Our love for God is corrupted and tainted. The philological foundation is human depravity. And I believe then we contrast this with God's love. God's love is the only perfect, selfish, selfless love as defined by scripture. Human love, by contrast, is often transactional, self serving, reinforcing the need for divine grace and christ imputed righteousness for salvation. God's love is

30:23 the only pure love. Our love is transactional, Our love is self serving. And I think this reinforces the need for divine grace. This reinforces the need for Christ's imputed righteousness. Our love is flawed, our love is inherently broken. I think that my hypothesis. I think that this. I know it paints as sobering, but I think it's a realistic picture of human nature. I think my hypothesis highlights the gap between human love and divine love. I believe my hypothesis screams at the need for grace. And if I want to double down on this, and I'll double down just a little bit, I'll go through this quickly. When we just consider let's take human love again. Let's consider it.

31:25 I think it's self seeking, self serving, it's selfish, it's not selfless. For example, when we love others, When we love others, I mention these briefly, but I want to just double down on this. When we love others, what are we doing. We're loving others to obtain something, all right, I mentioned this a minute ago. We love others to obtain emotional fulfillment, companionship, affection, a sense of being valid, it's the idea of being valued, the idea of being wanted. We are loving someone because we are trying to get emotional fulfillment. I love you. What do I get it? I get companionship, I get affection, I get a sense of being valued. I get a sense of being wanted.

32:05 I get something. I get something. I gotta get something in this, right, I mean, come on, I mean, you go to any couple's counseling, any marriage counseling, You're going to hear almost almost guaranteed, someone is going to say, I feel like I'm giving and I'm not getting. There's gonna be some discussion about an end balance. I'm not getting this. I don't feel supported, I don't feel wanted. I don't feel desired, I don't feel encouraged, I don't feel I feel lonely, I feel isolated, I don't feel provided for because because we approach it from a very human perspective. And then the council where then talk to the other why are you not providing this? Why are you not providing them? And then everyone has to figure out what they're doing, and then they're gonna try harder, they're gonna do better. So I will provide for you, and I'll provide for you because we have to approach it.

32:54 We approach you things from a very humanistic perspective. We love other because we're trying to obtain emotional fulfillment. We're trying to obtain a companionship. We're trying to obtain some sense of security and stability, financial support, protection, a sense of belonging in relationships. We are looking for security, We're looking for stability. Oh come on, no, I know are we allowed to say this? We love others because we're trying to obtain pleasure and satisfaction. Okay, come on now, don't sit there and look at me like that's not true.

33:36 We love others because we're trying to obtain physical intimacy. Come on, you know that to be true. We're trying to We're trying not only to have this physical intimacy, We're trying to find an enjoyment of shared experience. We're trying to find the satisfaction of being. We're trying to obtain the satis section of being cared for. We love to obtain, We love to get. Let just think, would you continue to love if you are receiving no emotional fulfillment, no companionship, no affection, no sense of being valued, no sense of being wanted, no sense of being supported, no sense of being seen, no sense of being heard. I think you're gonna you're gonna be like what me, myself and I can do better than this because I'm getting nothing from this. What if you don't feel any sense of security, any sense of stability. What if you're receiving no pleasure, no satisfaction, no none, no enjoyment of shared experience, no satisfaction, none of that. Come on, Come on, what's going to happen? How about? Uh? Do we not love

35:09 to obtain validation and affirmation? Don't we seek and love to boost our own self worth through being loved. We want to feel like we're loved. We want to feel like we are admired. We want to feel like we are appreciated. We want to feel like that we are that somehow in this relationship, I feel the best I feel. I feel that you get the sense of feeling almost superior, that it boosts you up, it builds you up. Well, if you don't feel any validation, if you don't feel any affirmation, if you don't feel like you feel like you're less than you're you're not you. Everything begins to fall apart from a human perspective. We we love in order to receive similar benefits. Right, We we love in order to get something back, Like we expect kindness, loyalty, and support and return for the love we get. We give love, and we expect that there is some repayment for that. Someone's going to have to do something similar.

36:16 They're like, if I give this much, I expect to get this. Right. If I'm doing this, I should get something of similar level back, something somewhere with something close. Right, And that imbalance is what you almost always hear in marital counseling. Right. Why do we love because we are? Are we love others? Why? Because we're seeking to obtain an avoidance of loneliness. You love because you want to fill the void of isolation. You seek a relationship because you want to provide a connection. If you love, and all you get in return is isolation and loneliness. And come on now, right now, there's more here I could go through. I've got a list here of things. The point is we love others to obtain Now, guess what we love God to obtain? Why do We love God because we're trying to obtain We want eternal security, right, We want the promise of heaven. We want the avoidance of eternal punishment. Again, would you love God if I'm sorry you God? Basically, if God responded with you love me, you still are going to burn in health for eternity?

37:32 Do you still love me? I don't know. We love in order to obtain blessing and provision. We may seek health, prosperity, protection, or answered prayers through our devotion. Are we doing it just because we love God and where we want or are we expecting some level of blessing, some level of protection, some level of provision. We love in order to obtain forgiveness and a peace of mind. We want to alleviate our guilt. We want to find comfort and being absolved from our sin. We love God because we want to obtain forgiveness. We want to feel a sense of peace. We love God because we're seeking to obtain purpose and meaning. We're deriving a sense of purpose, identity, and significance from a relationship with God. We love God to obtain because we want to have our fear reduced. We don't want any more fear of death, no more fear of suffering, no more fear of judgment. So we cling to love for God to alleviate these things, to avoid these things.

38:34 I hate to say it, In many cases, people supposedly love God because it gives them a sense of moral superiority. We feel righteous, we feel morally superior due to our religious devotion or perceived spiritual maturity. We love God to obtain hope, to obtain comfort. I think that we could. I think that we can be honest here right, that our noblest expressions, your noblest expression of love for others and love for God is typically almost always rooted in self interest, whether consciously or subconsciously. It basically highlights the contrast between love, our love, human love, and God's perfect selfless love, emphasizing why grace is essential. Now here then my hypotheses here. I know it ruins Valentine's Day. I know it destroys all of your ideas of love. And I understand it. Right, I'm not saying that this is like, oh, I welcome this and this, I understand this is a struggle, But come on, just be honest. How selfish are you?

39:56 You show up to get and you get what you we want, and then we go do what we want to do. It's about us us us us us us us us us. We like being in a situation where we're gonna get We like being in a situation where we have whatever we want. We know, we like that. Now, I believe this reality should have a profound hermeneutical impact on you as a Christian. This is really what I want to get to. I believe if we understand how flawed our love is, our love for God is flawed, our love for others is flawed. Right now, I'm gonna I'm gonna look here. I didn't even think about this, but I think this is the perfect time to do this.

40:49 I believe it's in the book of Matthew. I believe here here it is all right here it is Matthew, Chapter twenty two, Matthew Chapter twenty two, Verse thirty four. But when the Pharisees heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together. That one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law. Jesus said unto him, thou shall love the Lord that God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. The second is like unto it, Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. All of the law, all of the prophets is basically summarized. It's everything can be reduced down to love God, love others. Love God, love others. Well if I, if my hypothesis is correct that are love is inherently flawed at its very core, then gets where this leaves you. You will never love God because your love is flawed, saved or unsaved. You will never love others because your love is inherently flawed. And when I say you will never love God or never love others, you're never going to love them with the perfect kind of love because your love is inherently flawed. You love

42:23 your self, You love yourself more than God. You love yourself more than others, you love God. You love others for the benefit that you obtain for yourself. Now, the minute you realize that, then your entire hermeneutic changes, because now everywhere in the Bible where it talks about love tells you to love or expresses love. You know what you see there, You then see it is a law in which you cannot obtain. It is a law which you cannot keep. It is a law that no matter how hard you pursue, you will never come close to. So though all all everything the Bible has to say about love is there to simply condemn you and to reveal to you your inability, and then it can drive you only to what true love is. God is love.

43:14 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, It is God. It is Christ. God loves Christ is God's love in action. And if you want to find love, it's in Christ. By pursuing Christ, by coming to Christ and faith, his perfect love is imputed to my account. So then I can say, in Christ, I love God with all my heart, mind, body, and soul. I love my neighbors myself. But in practice I never will do any of things because I will never accomplish it, because I am flawed inherently internally. And I believe this perspective offers a deep law and gospel centered approach to scripture.

44:02 If human love is inherently self centered, then every command to love becomes a mirror reflecting our inability to meet God's standard. I believe this aligns with the idea that law exposes our sin. It shows us our need for Christ's perfect love and righteousness. I believe this changes your entire reading of scripture. You can go through everything. It's Valentine's Day. I don't know what you're doing, but you can use this weekend. Look up scripture after scripture on love, love, love, love, love, love, love, and when you see it, don't go. I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try. Go. I can't do this. I never will do this, but Christ did because God is love.

44:45 Christ is God's love in action, and by my faith in him, his perfect love is imputed to my account. So then I can stand in perfect love, not because I do, but because it's been imputed to my account. So my hypothesis. My hypothesis then would suggest that human love is inherently selfish, and that the biblical commands to love function as law that reveal our shortcomings. They direct us to Christ's perfect love. So let's let's look, let's just maybe we can finish this in one in one episode.

45:28 I was going to do this in multiple parts. But that's okay. This is a lot of important stuff. But let's just consider some different scriptures about love. Right, So let's consider the nature and supremacy of love. Now we know which chapter we're going to go to, right One Corinthians thirteen, and this the pinnacle. This is what everyone everyone talks about. I remember there was a wedding someone in my church. Well, I mean someone who used to be in my church, okay, but I remember reading First Corinthians thirteen at that wedding. Now I wish I would have went back and go, well, I'm going to read this today as these two people stand before all of us and God to get married, and I'm going to read First Corinthians thirteen. And here's what I want to demonstrate.

46:21 You guys are never going to do this. This passage condemns you to the eighteenth level of hell because you will never accomplish this. So don't drive off thinking, oh, I'm going to love you like First Corinthians thirteen, because you're not. You're gonna fail. She's gonna fail, he's gonna fail. Everyone here is going to fail. We can't do this. First Corinthians thirteen is not for us to strive to do. It's to condemn us so that we know we can't, and then it drives us only two, the only one who can. But let's look at it. First Corinthians thirteen, The nature and supremacy of love. Well, First Corinthians thirteen, I think gives the nature of supremacy of love. Let's just consider, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not charity, I become as a sounding brass or a tinkling symbol. Well, ladies and gentlemen, you are a sounding brass. You are a tinkling symbol.

47:15 And though I have the gifts of prophecy and understanding all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith so that can move mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. You are nothing. We are nothing more than sounding brass and tinkling symbols. We make a lot of noise, we say a lot of things. We may do a lot of religious things. We may say a lot of religious things, we may accomplish a lot of religious actions. But ladies and gentlemen, we are nothing. We are noise making nothings because we don't have true love and then it goes on to say, then, and though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned and have not charity, it profited me nothing. Now, please note this indicates that you could bestow all your goods to feed the poor. You could give your body to be burned and yet not have charity. It's possible to do those things without love. And guess what, we never do those things with true love. Our love is always flawed. One Corinthians thirteen is that this chapter is often referred to as the Love Chapter. It supposedly provides a profound description of love's characteristics and its pre eminence over every other virtue and gift. For example, as we just read, if I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but have not love, I'm a noisy gong, or a clinging symbol, as one translation puts it. He goes on

48:48 and we read things like love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It's not irritable, it's not resentful. It does not rejoin said wrongdoing. But it rejoices with the truth we see. So now faith, hope, and love abide. But the three, these three, but the greatest of these is love. This passage emphasizes that without love, even the most impressive spiritual gifts are meaningless, highlighting love's essential and selfless nature. Love is the supreme thing, and we don't have the supreme thing because we don't have love, so we fall short. This passage is to say, this is what it is, and this is what we end up becoming nothing, just making noise because we don't have this kind of love.

49:36 We are to see it as law, condemning us when we consider it. So the Bible in one Corinthians thirteen speaks of the nature and supremacy of love right, and we could go through all of all of those characteristics. Love suffereth long and is kind, love envieth, not love vaunted, not itself. It's basically when you start reading that, you sh start feeling like you're standing, you know, on the mountain, and God is giving his law and saying do this, do this, do this, and you're like, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't because you'll never do any of those things perfectly. But if we go through scripture. If we go through scripture here, I got to go find all the scriptures I have Here.

50:26 We also see that love is the fulfillment of the law. For example, Roman's thirteen eight, oh, no one anything except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. See, if you can love someone else, you can fulfill the law. Well, do you believe you can fulfill the law? I don't believe you can fulfill the law, meaning you can never going to love anyone, and that the logical conclusion. I'm gonna go. I'm gonna look at this text from a different translation, go to Romans thirteen, Oh, no man anything but to love one another, for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. Do you believe you can fulfill the law? Do you believe you can fulfill the law. If you can fulfill the law, then you don't need Christ and his fulfillment of the law.

51:15 You can't fulfill the law Christ did. How did Christ fulfill the law? Because he loved perfectly and he obeyed it perfectly. Okay, we can go beyond just that. But I'm just saying we can't fail. I wish I could fulfill the law because I could love others, But my love for others is flawed. Therefore I never truly fulfill the law. The only way I can fulfill the law is in Christ Galatians five fourteen. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, you shall love your neighbor as yourself Galatians five fourteen. Well, the whole law, the whole law is fulfilled and one word. I'm sorry. Then it's never going to be fulfilled, because I'm never going to love my neighbor as myself. These verses underscore that genuine love encapsulates the essence of God's commandments, positioning love as the ultimate fulfillment of the law. Love is the ultimate fulfillment of the law. I will ultimately never fulfill the law. Logically, that means I never truly love. That's my whole hypothesis, all right, So what about the source of love? Well, first John four seven, be love. Let us love one another, for love is from God. Whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. We love because He first loved us. This passage indicates that that love originates from God. And our capacity to love is a reflection of His love for us. Now, some people will say, well, if if we come to God,

52:46 then we can love. We're not going to love perfectly. Whatever love you think you have, it still inherently flawed. It never will be perfect, it will never be right. That's why you unied Christ. We have the greatest commandments. You shall love the Lord that God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. We have Matthew twenty two thirty seven through thirty nine, which we've read. Jesus identifies the love for God and neighbor as the foundation of all divine instruction, emphasizing the paramount importance. We are told to love our enemies, and Matthew five p. Forty four. We are challenged to extend our love beyond just family, just friends, just you know, romance. We have to love even our very enemy. We are told that love.

53:38 By this all people will know that you are my disciples. If you have love one for another, we have this idea of sacrificial love. Greater love has no one than this, that someone laid down his life for his friends. We have the idea that above all, keep loving one another. Earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins, going through all the different things, I'm just going through a number of scriptures about love. So I think we can say scripture on a pretty consistent basis, would describe love as self less, It would describe love as being sacrificial, it would demonstrate love as being central to the Christian life. But this is a high standard. I think the Bible, including one Corinthians thirteen, highlights the ideal of love that believers are called to embody and guess what that call is law.

54:40 It's telling us what it should be, what it looks like, so that we can then be confronted with what we do not possess, what we do not have, and what we do not give. So I believe my hypothesis then comes along and demonstrates that at law when it comes to law, reveals human inadequacy, driving individuals towards reliance on divine grace. The commands to love when viewed as law, they expose our self centered, self centered tendencies, are that at least state it this way. I believe when we see all the all the descriptions, all the discussion about love in the Bible, as law. Then it exposes our self centered tendencies towards towards selfishness. It's that it demonstrates how self centered we are, that our tendencies is to only love in order to get that. Everything about it is that that's we are self centered, and that ultimately this underscores the necessity of Christ's redemptive love. And I believe that my theological perspective then aligns perfectly with reality.

55:59 If you observe, if you just watch humans, watch yourself, observation of human behavior, observation of your own motives, you know what it reveals over and over, over and over and over that your selfishness taints even your well intentioned acts of love. I believe reality supports my theory that humans struggle to achieve the selfless love described in scripture. And this emphasizes the need for transformation through Christ. Or that's how one source put it. I don't I don't even like that way of describing it. It emphasizes our need to be transformed positionally, it emphasizes my need for imputed righteousness because I'm never going to be transformed, transformed to love perfectly. If you think when you become a Christian.

56:56 You now can love perfectly? Well, then Christian should love perfectly? How how how long have you been in the church? How long have you been around other Christians? Oh? Come on? Have you seen the selfishness that Christians will have in supposedly loving people. They'll stab you in the back, They'll lie, they'll deceive, they will be selfish. Come on, the church is filled with that. Everyone knows that. You know why, because we are inherently flawed. Now, I have a lot more here. I have a lot more here. All right. I was trying to skip around because I was going to try to finish this, but I literally have another probably four or five pages here because what I wanted to do was I wanted to break down First Corinthians thirteen, and I wanted to show how we perpetually fall short of First Corinthians thirteen. And then I want to show you First Corinthians thirteen and how it actually reflects God's attributes and Christ's actions when you read first we read First Corinthians thirteen. How is it always preached?

58:02 All right, we're gonna talk about love. Guys. Are you doing this? Women? Are you doing this? Children? Are you doing this? You fall short? You fall short, you fall short, You fall short, you fall short. Now what we need to do today is come to the altar, confess it, and we all need to leave here trying to do it better. And I know because I've preached that same kind of sermon on First Corinthians thirteen. One of the sermons where I had the most people ever come to the altar was when I was younger, and I preached on First Corinthians thirteen and how the church doesn't actually demonstrate this kind of love. And while everybody was convicted, I was convicted. Everyone was crying. It was an emotional It wasn't a powerful service. And then everyone got up and you know what we did. We continue to do the same thing we always do. It didn't change a stinking thing, because you know why, we are inherently flawed.

58:46 So guess what. I preached a law based message that convicted people. It got a lot of people coming to the altar. I felt like I'd preached really good. It was a great sermon. I feel Oh God moved im. Patted myself on the back. And you know what, I didn't change. They didn't change. No one changed, because guess why the point is I should have preached One Corinthians thirteen and said we all fall short. But First Corinthians thirteen describes the attributes of God, and it describes the actions of Christ. And if you see it that way, then you will say, I can't do it. Christ did this. Put my faith in him and his obedience to First Corinthians thirteen is imputed to my account. Then I can stand totally transformed in my position, knowing I will never be truly transformed in my practice until glorification. Right, So we can just go through First Corinthians thirteen. Just so I'm in Romans thirteen. So that's not going to help us very much. First Corinthians thirteen, and you can see this charity suffrith law, love suffereth long. Now, if we go, if we do this really quick, if I just I'm gonna break it down this way, I'm gonna break it down this way. I was, I'm just gonna go to my nose, I was gonna pull up, I was gonna I'm just gonna go through this quickly so that you get the basic idea. Right. So, if we look at

1:00:17 First Corinthians thirteen one through three, we have the necessity of love without love, even the most impressive spiritual gifts and self sacrificial acts are meaningless, meaning that we can do a lot of those things without love. Love is essential. Eloquence, knowledge, faith, generosity, and martyrdom, all of those are all lose their value if not driven by love. Meaning we can actually do those things without love, but we need love. And then if we look at the attributes of love, we'll go patient. We'll just go Love is patient. Well, this means we endure wrong and we delay retaliation. Are we? How patient are we? How long does our patient last? How long does our patience last? Kind? We act with goodness and care.

1:01:01 We're not envious. We do not resent other success or blessings, not boastful, arrogant. We have no pride or self centeredness. We're not rude. We respect others, not self seeking. We prioritize others' needs above our very own. We're not irritable. We're not resentful. We do not rejoice and wrong. We rejoice with the truth. We bear all things, We believe all things, We hope all things. Just go through all of those things? Do you do those perfectly? You fall short constantly, But you know who does these things? Perfectly God. You know who lived these things out perfectly Christ. So when First Corinthians thirteen, what you should see is not us, We should see Christ. And you know what, the Church of corinth they failed. And everything in First Corinthians thirteen, everything you read in First Corinthians, they fail in First Corinthians thirteen. So what was their hope? Christ? That changes the whole way we should interpret First Corinthians thirteen. So my hypothesis is human love is so inherently flawed, so inherently messed up. It's self seeking. We love to get. Therefore, everything in the Bible that speaks about love is law showing us our inability to do it, and that I can only love now. I think this is important when those scriptures talk about that that I love, that if I love God, then basically I get the ability to

1:02:32 love or or I somehow we find these scriptures that seemed in and maybe infer that I can now love because God loved me. Let me make it very clear, I only love perfectly in my position in Christ, I love people perfectly, and Christ, I love my enemies perfectly, and practice I don't love others perfectly. I don't love my enemies perfectly, but in Christ, I do so. Valentine's Day, I hope you have a wonderful one. I hope you celebrate it. I hope it's full of passion. I hope it's full of romance. I hope it's wonderful. I hope it's great. I hope I hope you have a playlist today.

1:03:27 I hope you're filled with all of those perfect feelings and it's amazing and it's great, and you just have the time of your life. But just know that it's a celebration of a flawed love. Now we can find a lot of satisfaction and fun and excitement and our flawed love. Not in any way denying that, but from a philological perspective, just know it's flawed. It's flawed, and you're going to feel that law in it more than you probably want to admit. But the only true source of a selfless, perfect love is God. And all of the scriptures that talk about love, they reveal our inability.

1:04:17 They condemn us, and they drive us right to Christ. Write to Him and write to his perfect love. I wish human love could be perfect, but it is not. You know it, and I know it, and God knows it, but he sent his son. Why Because God has perfect love. He sent his son to die for us, not because of what we can do, because we can't, not because of what we should do, because we never will. It's because he did so out of grace and mercy and a selfless love. So when you read the Bible and you see anything about love, you can say, low, I know I should, but I don't. I can't, I never will.

1:05:12 But Christ did. Now that's probably the worst Valentine's Day message ever preached. But come on now, just think today. Come on, just think today to really, I'll leave you a two questions. Would you love God? Come on, be honest. If God said no, heaven in eternity and hell, would you still love him? Number one? Number two, I want you to think about how much of your life, how much even of your perceived love is influenced it's impacted by self selfishness, not selflessness. How much is self centered? How much do you love in order to get? What if you've got nothing?

1:06:17 What if you had nothing? What would you love? Now? That will put you in a very hopefully a convicted state, going, Man, I don't really love God. I don't really love others, but I sure do love myself and I'm right there with you. So go celebrate your flawed love, but it is flawed, and you can be honest. Hey, I'm looking forward to Valentine's Day because of what I'm going to get. And if you don't feel like you're going to get something equal in return, and it's all going to be about you giving, you typically become frustrated and bitter and bothered and not as excited. Right, It's kind of the way it works. Everybody's expecting a certain thing.

1:07:16 All right, I'm going to stop right there. Thank you for listening. God bless