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I often think that as Christians we have confused the Gospel value of love with the social value of liking people. It’s not helped by the paucity of English in trying to translate the various Greek words for love – we can mean the emotions we feel for our family, the affection we feel for friends, the power of eroticism and selfless service of others in this term love. Often, however, we major on whether we like someone or not. Of course it’s good if we like those we encounter in our daily lives, in our workplaces and in our churches but whether, or not, we like them is irrelevant to the command to love.
The writer of 1 John sees the command to love as being on a par with the command to believe in Jesus. That’s quite something. Often in our credal statements – classic, from the Reformation era or contemporary – we focus on beliefs, finely honed words to reflect our deepest theological ideas. Yet we rarely, if ever, focus on our behaviour as a facet of Christian belief. Maybe if we did we’d find a third way between those who, rightly, focus on the importance of sound doctrine and those who, again rightly, focus on the importance of living well.
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