What is love? (Ep. 29)

What does it mean to love someone or something? The world's understanding of love often differs greatly from what God calls us to do. The Biblical definition of love carries a much deeper meaning.

In this episode, Pastors Chris and Tony will explore the Biblical call to love and discuss the different types of love described in Scripture. Ultimately, they will share how Christian love is rooted in the profound love that God has shown us through Christ Jesus.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Very nervous, the young man looks at the young woman and says to her for the first time, I love you. But what does he mean when he says, I love you? He's probably reacting to some emotions he's feeling. He's probably reacting to the butterflies in his stomach, even the physical attraction that he has for her, and he says, I love you. But what is love? Today we're going to look into the idea of love and see if there's some contrast or difference between how the world talks about love and how the Bible talks about love. And we'll address the concept of biblical love and what God calls us to do when He says, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. My name is Chris Flugeft. I'm the pastor at Grace Lutheran Church. I'm here with my brother, Pastor Tony Flugeft. He's a pastor at Christ the Vine Lutheran Church. And this is Double Portion, a podcast where pastors talk about the intersection of Christian living and studying the scriptures. So we're going to take this idea of love from our lives and apply it to what God's word truly says about these things. Well, I want to do before we get into our content for today is just give you an encouragement. You know how you found us today, whether it's on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or whatever platform. But it's always helpful to share a podcast with other people to expand the conversation so others can hear what this has to say and perhaps also benefit from it as well. And then it's always beneficial to give a review. You can do that on Apple Podcasts or to like, comment, and subscribe on YouTube so that this conversation can invite more and more people to join us.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

And you mean something very different than when a wife says to her husband that she loves him, or when a parent says to their child that they love their child. So there is a wide variety of meanings when you're talking about love. But I think often in our world, when people think about love, they think about making others happy. And I do think often when our world talks about love, it is really a sim simplistic idea that really connects to this idea of making someone happy.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

Yeah, I started with that picture of a young man saying he loves that young woman. And often how is he going to show his love for her? It's going to be through things that he does for her. He's going to hold the door open for her. So often in our society, people tie love to things that might make someone else happy. So then you might look at the opposite to help us define love, but that ask, how do you know that you hate someone else or how are you unloving towards that person? Well, you are doing things that inhibit their happiness, whether that's you are physically hurting or harming them, or, and here's going to be the problem with our world's definition of love, you are simply telling them that they shouldn't or can't do things that they want to do. And that's going to be where the we're going to have a huge divergence between the world's definition of love and God's definition of love, because God's definition of love doesn't mean you're going to always be happy. You use the illustration of a of a loving parent. And we recognize a loving parent is going to do things for a child that doesn't always make them happy, even though that's the best thing for them. I've used the illustration before of a child who wants to grab something off of the stove. Now the child might throw a fit, scream, and cry, and not understand why the parent won't let them touch the stove. But that parent is truly being loving, even though it's not going to make that child very happy. And then you go to the illustration you use with love is love. So the society says love is love that says love your neighbor and love people in this way. And they think that means to affirm their choices and to support their choices. However, if you want to truly love them, you're going to want to do what's best for them. And many times that means showing them the error of their way, showing them this path that you are going down is going to lead to destruction. So true love is going to lead to hard, difficult things.

SPEAKER_01 6:53

Yeah. So you talked about the child who's trying to touch the hot stove. The illustration I often use is the child wants to eat, let's say, chocolate. And they might be happy eating chocolate for every meal. They don't want to eat their fruits and their vegetables or their meat or whatever it might be. And the parent who loves that child can't simply make that child happy and give in to their demands. Rather, the parent that loves that child needs to do what is best for that child and tell them, no, you need to eat your fruits and vegetables. Because I love you, I'm doing what's best for you. This might not make that child happy. In fact, it might make that child angry and upset. They might cry, they might throw a fit. But the parent who loves that child is doing what is best for that child. So the person who loves the individual isn't just going to give in to their demands or allow them to do what they desire because it makes them happy, or at least they think it makes them happy. The parent or the individual, whoever it might be, that loves their fellow human is going to encourage that person to do what is best.

SPEAKER_00 8:06

Exactly. I want to grab onto something you had said a little bit earlier that even the world recognizes that there's kind of different forms of love. And you reference a video, and I think it'd be good for us to explore that a little bit more. We recognize that love doesn't just mean make someone happy, but maybe let's make it a little bit more specific on how there's a difference between how I love my child and how I love football, right? Everyone recognizes there's a difference between those things. And to have that recognition and definition is going to be really important for us as we talk about this and how do you, as a Christian, love someone or love something because your love for your child ought to be very different than your love for a game and something you enjoy doing. So, although this is not going to be a one-to-one correlation between how our world talks about love today, but I think there can be help in the different types of love in the Greek language. And I'm sure you're familiar with this. I think it's C.S. Lewis has a book that talks about the different types of love. This is an area of study that many people have, even if you don't have a background in the biblical languages like we do, you're going to have an idea of this. But the forms of love that there are in the Greek language that are most commonly spoken about would be the phylos love, the storge love, the eros love, and the agape love. Of those ones that I just used, we're going to have phylos and storge and agape are used in the Bible. Eros is not used in the Bible. I'm happy to talk more about them, but maybe we can dig a little bit deeper into these ideas of love in the Greek language, how they're used in the Bible, and how that helps us understand what the love we're called to. So Phyllis would be the first one that I want to look at.

SPEAKER_01 10:19

No, I do think just to be completely transparent with this conversation, sometimes these arguments are overplayed. If you actually look at the Greek, does agape always mean the self-sacrificial love that we'll get into? I think there's pretty good exegetical arguments to say this can be certainly overplayed, but I think it's helpful to have these categories to talk about the different types of love, like the like the flow brotherly love or or and how those play out in different relationships.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Yeah. I think that's a really good point. So recently I was teaching a Bible study on the fruit of the spirit at my church, and we got into the fruit of love. So then in the fruit of love, we talked about these different definitions or ideas of love in the Greek language. And that is one of the points I wanted to bring to the table. Is when we use a word, we can't completely just take the word outside of its context and say, this is what this word means, and then it totally dictates then what this sentence means. In exegetical fallacies, D.A. Carson says a word is a stupid thing outside of its context. So when we take these words to rather rather than viewing it as here is the Greek word and here are the potential definitions, what we want to be more is the semantic range and say, like, here's the use of this word. And based off of all these uses, here's kind of the concept of what this means or a good idea communicated in the English language. We'll get into agape. I want to get into agape last, just because agape has the most use in the Greek New Testament. But you're very right in saying, although so often you have that quick definition of sacrificial love in agape, if agape is going to be used over 130 times in the New Testament, it's going to be pretty clear that it is not always self-sacrificial love that's being communicated there. It seems that that's just the primary word for love. And phylos is the second most used, and then storge is used very infrequently, actually, and it's often in the compound form, even one of them being with phylos. So when it comes to the Greek New Testament usage of these words, we want to be careful about not constructing too strong of an argument. But I think it's still helpful for us to think about these different words for love and then how they might be used. So with that preface, you got some thoughts on Phyllis love?

SPEAKER_01 13:09

Just this idea that we we've got the relationship love where it's different than that. It's different than the erotic arrows, romantic love. And so like a lot of people think of like the city of Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love. And I think maybe that is a helpful thing to just consider as you you think the relationships that you have in in life in the way that you might love that person that's in your relationship, even if it's not your typical thought of love in a romantic society. But you've got that that care, that deep care for someone in your life. You're you're willing to go out of your way to help them, you're willing to serve them, you're willing to do what is is best for them. And these relationships are valuable when you think of friendship type love or brotherly type love. We live in a society that unfortunately continues to be detached from one another. I just saw an article from The Atlantic that was talking about how people have become dechurched and then now they don't have a community. And so we live in a in a world where people lack community, and I think they can lack that kind of relationship, phleophilus type love, and and not have that connection with others that we we really do need as humans. This is the way that God has has knit us together. And and so just to highlight that, although often the rom com or the sitcom shows the pursuit of that romantic love, this is a very important love, even if it's a relationship where the word love is not thrown out all that often.

SPEAKER_00 15:03

Yeah, I think that's a really important point. So as I study the use of this in the Greek New Testament, I think a good idea that's really packed in there is friendly affection. And so the one of the prominent usages that comes to my mind is with when Jesus rose Lazarus from the grave. So the Lazarus sister sent a message and said that to Jesus, the one that you love is sick. And this is the form of love that's used there. So then it's important for us to recognize this is talking about friendly affection. We don't need to charge all sorts of wrong ideas behind that.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Like what people will do with Jonathan and David.

SPEAKER_00 15:46

Exactly. And I want to get into that some more pretty soon. And then when you fast forward later into that account, when Lazarus is in the tomb before Jesus has risen him from the grave, Jesus weeps. And right after that, very short verse in the text, the people who witnessed this say, see how he loved him. So people could recognize that Jesus had this friendly affection love for Lazarus. He was a dear friend of Jesus'. And there's all sorts of applications that we could pull out from this. Lazarus does not get much, he doesn't get much explanation. He isn't spoken about very often in the Greek New Testament. Yet he is a man that Jesus had this friendly affection for. He was a dear friend of Jesus's. So I think that's cool to think about these human relationships that Jesus had. And even though Lazarus wasn't one of the apostles, uh, Lazarus still had this wonderful relationship with the Lord. And he just had a different calling in life. He had a different station and a different status, but he still had this friendly affection love with the Lord Jesus. I want to get more into this idea of friendship love. I think that we live in a society that has become so romanticized in the wrong sense, eroticized in another, that people have become greatly confused, and this sort of friendly affection has been tarnished and misunderstood to a great extent. You mentioned it when you mentioned David and Jonathan. There's these people who study the scriptures with a different angle and things that they want to prove, and they will say things like, Well, you know, I think that David and Jonathan were homosexuals with each other. Maybe they would say they thought David was a bisexual and Jonathan was a homosexual. We don't need to get too far into that, but they have this slant because their view of love has been so tarnished that they they struggle to see the truth about friendship, love. And I think that really hurts their their lives in many ways. Do you have any reaction? I'll hand it over to you. And then I have some other thoughts that I want to go down that road.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Yeah, I would agree. Things become very sexualized when they don't need to be because we fail to have these concepts, maybe due to lack of exposure. And so there are stats that are out there that something like the average man has like maybe less than three close friends, often will express really not having any close friends. And so they have work associates or maybe someone they go to church with, but not the type of person that they're gonna go and get a coffee or a beer and have a meaningful interaction with, or not the type of person that they could invite over on a Friday night to come and watch the fight or the game or whatever it might be. And and so they they just don't have the terms to speak of this because they're not experiencing it in their own life. And so maybe they're married or they have an idea of romantic love, and so they can think of that type of love, but then they have a a struggle in classifying this male friendship or female friendship that is valuable, that is exemplified in scripture. And then you said people kind of look to weaponize their own views in scripture and come up with all sorts of backstories as well. So then that's not helpful either because our our culture is just so lost.

SPEAKER_00 19:59

Yeah, and I think the culture being lost is where this really ends up hurting and harming kids. And so we have a lot of young people who sadly this oversexualization of love, this failure to define platonic friendship love, has left them in an area where they are questioning, they are wondering what's going on. So when we have a world that has talked about love in always this romantic sexual way, uh, that can cause a lot of confusion. Imagine this boy, this young man who loves his friend, but the world tells him that love is a spectrum, love is almost always tied to sexuality, and then the world's really pushing him to question like, what is this? when the the root of it is friendly affection. I think this also creates problems for people who do not fit the stereotype of what boys always act like and what girls always act like. So you imagine a situation where there's a young man who doesn't like sports and he doesn't like cars, and because of his interests, he ends up having a lot of friendships with girls. But he also has a longing for friendly affection with other men. What does the world tell him? The the world often will tell him to twist that and view this isn't a longing for phyllous love, this is a longing for a different sort of love. I think that this can really pervert and change and mess up how people interact with one another and creates a problem because of this failure. To understand this failure to promote friendship affection, which is another one of those forms of love. So that's the phylos love. I think it's an important one. We could probably do a whole nother episode on friendship. Did you have thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Well, I was gonna think, I was thinking just if someone who's listening finds themselves in that position to say, like, I desire platonic friendships, this this phyllos love, where could they get started? I think it might just be helpful to provide some encouragements and and maybe some instruction. I I think a lot of people are used to having friendship automatically available until they hit a certain stage in life. So they go to school and there's just people that they go to school with that they're gonna do stuff with, they play sports, and there's people who they they interact with. And like kind of the equation for uh friendship is is similar interests or activities and and time, frankly. If you if you have those two things, you're probably gonna end up making some friends. If you're regularly interacting with these people who are in a similar activity or connected with you, and you have that consistent time, there's gonna be friendships that develop. And then people go out into the the workforce and there's some awkwardness about workplace friendships. We were sold a picture of what the workforce looks like from the office, and for a lot of people, that's just not not their experience. They don't build those same strong connections, whether they're working remotely, or they're working on projects by themselves, or they're with people who just don't desire socialization, and they they are in their 30s, and they'll say, I don't I don't have any friends. And so there's the joke online that like the greatest miracle that Jesus performed was that he had 12 close friendships in his 30s, and so a lot of people feel like they want this and they don't know how to get this done. And and so what one thing I would encourage someone is to be the friend, to go out of your way, to make the connections. And so if you need to manufacture that consistent interaction, be the one who's willing to just invite people to go do things. Maybe you wanna you're a relatively young man and you want to just join a sports league and you invite other people. Hey, you want to do this with me? Then you'll have those shared experiences. Maybe you're in the sports league already or you're in some activity and you're the one who invites, hey, let's go and get uh appetizers and a drink after this. So you have those opportunities to socialize. And then when you are doing those socializing activities that you instigated, and I I really emphasize that I do think you need to be the one that instigates that you can't you can't rely on other people to do this. Be willing to ask questions about the other person. If you just answer their questions and you don't ask them anything, the conversation's going to stall. It's going to be awkward, it's going to be uncomfortable, and you're both going to walk away dissatisfied. And so have that opportunity to socialize and then do the socializing. It might feel awkward at first if you're not used to doing this. Maybe even have a couple of questions that you like to ask people that kind of break the ice and get the conversation going. And so I'm just kind of some silly examples I've used in the past, like asking people, what's your what are your top four or five favorite fast food restaurants? Because almost everyone needs fast food. We have opinions on these things. And it kind of gets the the rapport going, having a couple different questions. And then there are simple questions about like what do you do for a living? What do you enjoy about that? People might not like that at first, being the one asking that question. But the reality, especially for men in their 30s to 60s, is they probably have a job, and that's probably the thing in their life that they spend the most time doing. And so you can ask them about that, be curious, try to get to know them, to continue the conversation. And as you have those conversations, you're going to grow a stronger connection. And so if you feel like you don't have friends and you feel like you don't have these connections, it's not actually outside of your reach. There are things that you can do to build these stronger connections. Now, understand these things take time. And so this is something I would say like when I was younger, I was maybe a little, I don't know, frustrated or bitter about going to a school when other people had gone to school with each other for a long time. It kind of is like you're trying to break in and they already have this tight bond, and and it's easy to grow frustrated with that. But to understand, well, you can't be best friends with someone immediately. It just doesn't, it doesn't work that way. It takes time to build those types of connections. But then also don't undervalue family connections. I mean, if you have people in your family, if you're siblings, make those connections. Those are people that God has already put in your life that you can have kind of that social kind of friendship, social kind of love with as well.

SPEAKER_00 27:28

I want to encourage further on this idea of asking questions and how important this is. Recently I read a book, it was like The Art of Asking Questions, and a the author used several illustrations to show how important asking good questions is. And he used the example of the the barber he went to and it said, you know, other barbers might be cheaper, they might be faster, but this barber asked really good questions and kept him going. Why people like talking about themselves. So then get people to talk about themselves to you, and they're going to associate that positive feeling with their interactions with you. And then that's also tied to how you might answer questions too. The chances are that you're not just going to interrogate that person. Like when they ask you questions when you need to answer too, right? You're not just going to ask them questions the whole time. But then to avoid what might be called shift answers, where like they ask you a question and you shift it into the thing you want to talk about instead. So it's important to think about this dialogue. I like your encouragement of having some prepared ideas or questions, interesting questions, rather than making small talk and saying, like, what where did you go where did you go to school? Like they can give a very easy, simple answer. Like, ask questions that invite further. Yeah. So what do you like about where you went to school? Something that can just like dig a little bit further beyond that.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

If they're married, how did you and your spouse meet each other? Usually there's a story. And in the study of like relationships and communication, one of the tenants of a strong relationship is reminiscing, and people like to reminisce on the past. And so you're showing interest in them as an individual, again, on one of the biggest parts of their lives. And so having that conversation, okay, well, how did the two of you meet? And they'll usually they're willing to share and and they they enjoy it. A positive thought of like thinking back on the good times and they associate that with you. Now, it is hard sometimes when you're stonewalled and people give short answers, and then it is frustrating at times too, where I've done this, and I'm trying to make conversation, and then I I leave the interactions. Like they didn't ask a single question about me the entire time. And I've I've walked away from social experiences like that a number of times. And I do think this is a place where we just need to remember that our identity is in Christ, and we need to set our egos aside and just say, okay, well, then maybe I wanted to talk about myself a little bit and they didn't ask anything about me. It is what it is. I'm loved by God. I I don't need to prove my value through this social interaction.

SPEAKER_00 30:40

Yeah, I think that's a good point to bring up. And I think it's important for us to recognize that as we strive to amplify these connections that we have and friendly affection, to recognize that not every interaction is going to be great. Not every interaction is going to be perfect. And like think about all of your relationships, other than like if you have a spouse, it probably wasn't like an immediate infatuation that you felt with most people anyway. So think about your relationships. Often it is quantity of time that creates quality of time, like spend time together, create memories. So if you have that first quote unquote friend date, like the first time you go out and get coffee and or get a beer together, it might feel a little bit awkward. It might not be like, oh, that was the most fun I've ever had with anyone. But if you continue to get together, you continue to be on that team, quantity of time will help create quality of time.

SPEAKER_01 31:56

And I think this is a place where we need to make ourselves available. We used to joke with one of our good friends, like one of our best friends, that his best quality was availability. And it was kind of whatever, teenagers just being goofy. But there's actually a lot of truth to that. When someone allows themselves to be available for social time, that helps to build that relationship. And so it grows frustrating when someone gets invited to do things and they decline you every time. If you're the type of person who after you get home from work, uh you want to just rest and relax, and then after you, after a long week, you just want to relax at home. Don't be surprised if that when that leads you to decline invitations, if you stop getting those invitations. You have made yourself unavailable. Or or you're the type of person who likes to decompress by playing video games, and then that's a high priority for you. Again, don't be surprised if you don't get those invitations. People like when people are available. You'll even overlook maybe social differences or or interest differences when someone's available because they're showing interest, they're showing effort, whereas your perceived lack of interest and effort from the person who declines the invitations.

SPEAKER_00 33:22

And I think overlooking some differences or quirks or the areas in which that person is maybe lacking is necessary. Yes. Absolutely necessary. Just like you need to recognize when you're in the dating pool that not you're not gonna find the perfect person in every single regard. When you're going out into the friendship mingling atmosphere, you're not gonna find the perfect friend. Uh, you're everyone's going to have their downfalls. That one person's going to be a little bit late, that other person's going to be a little bit flaky, that other person isn't going to like everything that you like, that other person's going to be a little bit socially awkward. Like everyone's going to have some struggle in some area. And you're going to have to get past that.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

And as you do, you you kind of become more okay with it. Yeah. It's just like, well, I know this person and I care about them. And I understand maybe they have this quirk, but I care about this person. And so you, as you maybe are okay with the fact that not everyone's perfect and understand that you yourself are not socially perfect, you can begin to overlook the perceived social failures of the individual.

SPEAKER_00 34:44

Yeah. So we're talking about this friendly affection. In the New Testament, Phyllis can use be used for more than just friendships. It's used for Jesus as with Lazarus as his friend. It's also used in other occasions for family relationships. This is just this idea of this friendly affection that you would have for people. The next one is storge. And as I said, it's not used a ton in the New Testament. It's often in the compound form. One of the uses or multiple uses is with the a prefix, which means to be like without love. So it seems that storge is more of this just like base natural love. So often people tie it to familial love. So this is kind of just like what is natural to have this normal relationship. So the two uses of it being in the a prefix form in the Bible are talking about the wicked. So the wicked are without storgay. So the wicked don't just have this natural love that you would have for a family member. So you think about the the love that a parent has for their child. Why do they love them? They just do. It just comes natural to them and then it leads to action. But this natural familial love they have isn't in response to something that the child does. It's just what they have. It's natural, and the wicked lack this natural love in so many ways.

SPEAKER_01 36:27

And I want to advocate for the value of kind of holding this type of love for your family. In so many aspects of life, we feel like we're we're trying out, we're we're trying to impress people. We we feel like we need to prove our value, and in theological terms, you might say we're trying to justify ourselves. So I've talked about this with social media in the past. I I really think that social media is just like a microcosm of people's pursuit for self-justification. I want people to think that I'm valuable, that I'm worthwhile, that I matter, and I need to prove that through my works, through what I present. There is so much value in having people in your life who just love you because they love you, because we're family. And you think of some of these ideas that get presented in TV and media of that like blood thicker than water, and we might not always like our family members, but we we love them. And I do actually think that's incredibly valuable that you have these people who just naturally love you because they love you, because they're your parent, because they're your sibling, because we're family. You don't need to try out to try to win their love. They just love you. And and so kind of to encourage people to hold on to that, because unfortunately, with a lot of modern psychoanalyzation, you even hear of people who their psychologist is advocating for them to cut off their family relationships. And that's where you should really question if a person who's not a Christian is trying to do soul care for you and they're encouraging you to cut off your family relations, like that should really give you pause. A person who's not a Christian that you're paying to be your friend is telling you to cut off your family who loves you because they love you. Now, in some certain circumstances, are there like family members who are toxic and actually do cause pain? Like maybe, yeah, that's legitimate. And and we do deal with these things on a case-by-case scenario. But again, if you have a person who's not a Christian attempting to do soul care with the religion of this world who's telling you to cut off your family, and and again, you're paying them, and they're not going to be for you, they be there for you when you're all alone, unless you pay them. Like you should really, really question if this is a good idea. But I've seen situations where this happens where a child cuts off their relationship with their family for that very reason. And and and so to encourage people to to value that, to to have these people in your life that you love because you love them, because you're related, and and you're gonna you're gonna fight for them and and you're gonna be there for them, even with all of their failures. Because the person that you're gonna sin against in your life most is gonna be your your spouse. But after that, like your family. They they're the ones that see the worst of you and and to to show like, hey, we're there for you no matter what.

SPEAKER_00 39:43

Yeah, it makes me think. I don't know if I should use this as an example, but I'm going to. It makes me think of an interview that Caleb Hammer had. So Caleb Hammer is at times a very crude man, but he does like financial advice interviews with people. And he was talking with a person who had disconnected herself from her biological family, and she kept using the verbiage of something like the family I chose. And I think he kept on responding, you mean your friends, you mean your friends. But so she had disconnected herself from this storegate, this natural love, and put all of it into the phyllos love. And one of the warnings that we need to have for people is that there is nothing wrong with breaking up a friendship necessarily. Friends can come and friends can go. Friendship relationships can kind of dissolve without any anyone doing anything sinful or wrong, right? This is not a relationship you are called to, to be there for that person's entire life. You might have a number of reasons why you need to love your neighbor as yourself, and we'll get more into the agape love later on. But friendship relationships can dissolve, and this person had disconnected herself from that natural family relationship. And as you said, this is just way too common of a story, and I think that can be so hard on families and for individuals to lose these people who are there for them through thick and thin, are there for them, even if their politics don't align. Yeah. People who are there for them, not just because of who they are and what they do. Yeah. Here's an encouragement for parents, then, on the other end, make your home a home of that storgay love. Things can be very hard for teenagers. Teenagers go through life and not only are there hormones going all over the place, but they have other people who are trying to impress on them, like your identities on the things that you do. If you're not good enough, you should feel bad. And they can struggle to have this home be a place where they are loved because that's just part of what families are called to do. Yeah. Like this natural love. So your teenager, no matter what's going on on the football field, no matter how much they excel or struggle in the classroom, no matter what's happening with that boyfriend, girlfriend situationship, like they can come home and this is a place of love for them.

SPEAKER_01 42:44

And when that's lacking, how that leads to sin often. You think of kind of the this idea that's often presented in TV shows, which I think comes from reality of like the girl who has daddy issues, and and how the lack of that love from her father led her to pursue love from men. And often she feels like she needs to try out for that love because she didn't have that natural love from her father, and now she seeks it. And and these men will take advantage of her and and and use her, and they're not they don't even actually love her. And so you you see this unfortunately as a thing where people will complain where their their dads kind of pulled back a little bit as they got older, because the dad knew how to love his little girl when she was young, but as she got older, it became a little more complicated. He didn't know how to show love to her and and to encourage dads to continue to show love to their to their daughters, especially and their sons. The sons might it might show in a different way as they feel like they didn't have love from their parents, maybe feeling like they need to prove themselves through work or whatever it might be. To prove their value. But as you withhold that type of love from your child, it's going to lead them to seek it in an unhealthy way elsewhere.

SPEAKER_00 44:11

So this doesn't mean that you can't like push your children to excel. You can't encourage them to be their best on the athletic field and in the classroom and encourage them to try different things. But what I would encourage very deeply and strongly is that the love that the parents have for that child should not and cannot be tied to their achievements there.

SPEAKER_01 44:40

And and I think we have drastically overrated high school achievements to two absurd levels. Where high school sports, high school football, high school basketball is the highest priority for some families, for some parents. And even like which seems like maybe a a better alternative, but grades, the grades that they get in school are the highest priority. And the this child feels like they need to excel. And and like I'm not advocating for students to not try in school. I think it's valuable. But it's okay if if they just end up having a normal job and raising a family. But I I think parents need to also consider like what what do I want my child to grow up to be? And are sports and grades as important as I have presented them as being?

SPEAKER_00 46:02

Yeah. So this is a natural form of love that we are called to have. You have your your child, you love your child because that that child is a child God gave you. And you have your parents. You love your parents because those are the parents that God gave you. You love your family. And as I said already, the the use of this love in the Bible is the negative form of it, saying the wicked don't have this love. I could probably go on a tirade about how our world has just pushed people more and more away from this familial structure of this basic sort of love. And you will have disingenuous arguments where people will say, like, what do you mean biblical family values? Look at how messed up all the families are in the Bible. That's not what's being said. We're saying how God has structured the family, that God has given these people for you to love them, and how beneficial that is for people to have these ones who love them outside of what they have done.

SPEAKER_01 47:12

And how absurd it is to try to replace that with a bunch of people on the internet.

SPEAKER_00 47:17

Exactly. We apologize for the abrupt transition there. It turns out my phone was out of storage and cut off our uh recording there. We were talking about store-gay love, which is this sort of natural familial love that someone has. When the Bible uses store-gay love, it's usually with an a prefix, which means without it. So the wicked don't have this natural sort of love. And sadly, we can see that's so common in our society. Our encouragement for families was to be a place where someone can have love outside of what they accomplish or do. Parents to love your children outside of the things that they do on the athletic field or in the classroom. Just love them because they are the gift that God has given to you. And children love your parents in this natural sort of way as well. So the next sort of love is not used in the Bible for this term. However, the concept's certainly there. And this is Eros love. Do you want to have some thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_01 48:18

Yeah, like you said, not specifically mentioned, but we see the idea present, this romantic husband-wife type love. And there was a time in Christian history where this was maybe spoken against as though it was a bad thing. But as we see books like Song of Songs or the encouragement that the Apostle Paul gives to husband and wives to not give up their relations for more than a short period of time where they're dedicated to prayer, we see that it is of value. And we see this even in the way that God has designed men and women to function, that women still enjoy sexual relations after their childbearing years. So God has given this as a blessing. And so we don't want to view it as a bad thing properly used. It's a good thing, it's a gift from God. And so the encouragement is for um unmarried people to view this as a good thing in its proper place, to not uh look for it outside of marriage, but to pursue a godly marriage and for husbands and wives to to love one another and to see this as an expression of that love that you have, to be committed to a loving sexual relationship that God has blessed you with as you look to serve Him in that relationship. And that might even sound strange to someone, serve God through your sexual relationship, but it is truly a gift from God and a way to love your spouse and and a wonderful gift to be utilized in its proper place.

SPEAKER_00 49:54

Yeah, it's such an important thing for us to recognize that uh so often Christians might think that sex rather than being a three-letter word, is a four-letter word. It's a naughty thing that we shouldn't talk about. That's not true. Sex is a beautiful expression of the love that husbands and wives have, and it's a gift that God has given to them. And we can recognize this, and and the husband and wife can cherish this relationship that they have with each other. The final form of love is the agape or agape love. Christians are probably most familiar with this one because it's the most prominent use of the word love in the Bible. So I think we go first to John 3:16 and say, For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. So God's love shown in this, that he sacrificed his son, gave him on the cross to die for the sins of the whole world. People who don't not earn or deserve it. And this is the triune God. So God sacrificed his son, but also sacrificed himself, that he would be willing to give up himself for these people. That is the love that God has. And we are called to love others in response to the love that God has for us. Jesus gives a summary of the greatest commandments, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we can love our neighbor in this self-sacrificial sort of way. I think we could probably bring our attention to 1 Corinthians 13. I think this is a wonderful section of scripture. Sometimes people talk about it as if it's a cliche because it's so well known. However, it's not a cliche, it's a wonderful expression of what is love. Do you have some thoughts on 1 Corinthians 13, love here?

SPEAKER_01 51:52

Yeah. As you look at this section, it's not necessarily complicated. And a lot of these ideas are things that mature Christians can know are good, but it's probably a good thing to just read through it and be reminded, be encouraged to hold this forth and say, this is how I strive to love those whom God has put before me as I love in response to Christ's love. We love because he first loved us, and now I want to love. And then we see the characteristics of love. Love is patient, love is kind, it does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud, it goes on and on. And we want to show that kind of love as we sacrifice of ourselves and do, because love is not just words or flattery, but we show our love through our action as we try to love these people that God has put before us. And when we love these people, we are loving God in response.

SPEAKER_00 52:50

Yeah. I think it's interesting in this section. And kind of one of the things I pull out of this is don't have action without love and don't love without action. So we we are called to go show our love for God and for other people in response to the love that God has for us by by doing things. Love is active. So often the love that we're called to as Christians may look very different than the love that the world has. It's not all about emotions. Often it's uh demonstrated in action. We might have other sorts of relationships, but in all of these, whether it's friends, whether it's a spouse, whether it's children, we we can show this self sacrificial love to them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:39

God's blessings as you look to love those whom God has put before you.