Problem with "God is Love"

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I didn’t ask what is the meaning of love instead I asked what Love is.
 
I think that the love that we experience is different from Love therefore Love cannot be connected to what we experience.
 
STT said:
I think that the love that we experience is different from Love therefore Love cannot be connected to what we experience.
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So love is willing the good of the other, but the other should not experience it.

And you aren’t going to parse the meaning of words endlessly.
ok…got it
 
In the context of John’s letter, John is speaking of a couple things. First and foremost, God has demonstrated his love to us through his son Jesus Christ. That Jesus Christ humbled himself and became incarnate, and died for our sins. That said, John’s letter constantly says that we too are to love one another. He constantly tells us that when we obey God’s law, we demonstrate God’s love. His law tells us what it means to love our neighbor. In this sense, God is our creator and has created his moral law for our benefit, that we would operate within his design and submit to one another by obeying God’s law for how we are to relate to him and to one another.
 
You have asked what love is.
Love is laying down your life for another.
This is what Jesus did for us. This is love.

I point you to one of the most beautiful chapters in the Bible.

1 Corinthians, chapter 13

13:1 Though I command languages both human and angelic – if I speak without love, I am no more than a gong booming or a cymbal clashing.
13:2 And though I have the power of prophecy, to penetrate all mysteries and knowledge, and though I have all the faith necessary to move mountains – if I am without love, I am nothing.
13:3 Though I should give away to the poor all that I possess, and even give up my body to be burned – if I am without love, it will do me no good whatever.
13:4 Love is always patient and kind; love is never jealous; love is not boastful or conceited,
13:5 it is never rude and never seeks its own advantage, it does not take offence or store up grievances.
13:6 Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but finds its joy in the truth.
13:7 It is always ready to make allowances, to trust, to hope and to endure whatever comes.
13:8 Love never comes to an end. But if there are prophecies, they will be done away with; if tongues, they will fall silent; and if knowledge, it will be done away with.
13:9 For we know only imperfectly, and we prophesy imperfectly;
13:10 but once perfection comes, all imperfect things will be done away with.
13:11 When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, and see things as a child does, and think like a child; but now that I have become an adult, I have finished with all childish ways.
13:12 Now we see only reflections in a mirror, mere riddles, but then we shall be seeing face to face. Now I can know only imperfectly; but then I shall know just as fully as I am myself known.
13:13 As it is, these remain: faith, hope and love, the three of them; and the greatest of them is love.
 
STT said:
I think that the love that we experience is different from Love therefore Love cannot be connected to what we experience.
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Why then are love and Love the same word? They are grouped together in our language because they have a common meaning.
 
Dovekin said:
Why then are love and Love the same word? They are grouped together in our language because they have a common meaning.
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Of course God is not subjective thing, what we feel, love. So there should be a difference between Love and love.
 
Wesrock said:
Whether or not one acknowledges God it doesn’t change that, from the Christian perspective, any act of love is still in the image of God, a similitude of God, albeit limited.
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What I’m getting at is some believers will try to use the “God is love” mantra to define him into existence. For example:
  1. God is love.
  2. Love exists.
  3. Therefore, God exists.
Or they’ll try to make claims about non-believers based on that same mantra:
  1. God is love.
  2. Non-believers love.
  3. Therefore, non-believers seek God even if they won’t admit it to themselves or others.
 
CCC 43 we must recall that “between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying an even greater dissimilitude”; and that “concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and how other beings stand in relation to him.”
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There is always a difference. You should read CCC 39-43 How can we speak about God?
 
goout said:
Love isn’t about getting credit. It’s a act of the will simply and purely for the sake of the other. Credit is results and love isn’t contingent on results.
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I agree that love isn’t about getting credit. That doesn’t mean people won’t use love to try and give credit to God (see my previous post in response to Wesrock).

True love is willing to forgive, even after death. True love does not desire to be praised profusely and worshipped.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
Or they’ll try to make claims about non-believers based on that same mantra:
  1. God is love.
  2. Non-believers love.
  3. Therefore, non-believers seek God even if they won’t admit it to themselves or others.
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Or, as St Paul said it:
What therefore you unknowingly worship, I proclaim to you.
Acts 17:23
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Mike_from_NJ said:
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Wesrock:
Whether or not one acknowledges God it doesn’t change that, from the Christian perspective, any act of love is still in the image of God, a similitude of God, albeit limited.
Click to expand...
What I’m getting at is some believers will try to use the “God is love” mantra to define him into existence. For example:
  1. God is love.
  2. Love exists.
  3. Therefore, God exists.
Or they’ll try to make claims about non-believers based on that same mantra:
  1. God is love.
  2. Non-believers love.
  3. Therefore, non-believers seek God even if they won’t admit it to themselves or others.
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The former is a bad argument. The second is true but really isn’t an argument for God in itself or self-evident. It’s more of a thing that follows after other points have been proved, but it can’t stand as a logical argument by itself.
 
Wesrock said:
The former is a bad argument. The second is true but really isn’t an argument for God in itself or self-evident. It’s more of a thing that follows after other points have been proved, but it can’t stand as a logical argument by itself.
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We agree they are not good arguments. Still they are presented often to non-believers.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
I think people (especially those evangelizing) should maybe avoid the phrase “God is love” until there is an agreed-upon meaning for love in that context.

Another problem occurs when love comes from someone who either does not know or does not believe in Jehovah. If you want to say he gets credit for love in those cases, then we can assign all sorts of attributes to beings without a whiff of proof.
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In fairness, you also need to remember that love itself is an abstract humanist concept that also lacks a whiff of proof as it pertains to the empiricism your worldview consistently invokes.

The irony of this always delights me.

God must pass a material standard, but not love. 😂
 
Vonsalza said:
In fairness, you also need to remember that love itself is an abstract humanist concept that also lacks a whiff of proof as it pertains to the empiricism your worldview consistently invokes.

The irony of this always delights me.

God must pass a material standard, but not love. 😂
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I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Love empirically exists. I’ve felt it. I have observed others experience it and have seen them act based on that love. Now that doesn’t mean we know what love is. Is it just chemicals in our brain honed from years of evolution to propagate the species, or is it something supernatural? We don’t know, which is why I can’t accept the certainty people have in saying “God is love”.

And the standard for showing a concept exists differs greatly from showing an entity exists. The belief in luck and curses is demonstrably real, while we can’t show that the belief is accurate. The same is true for any deity. The belief is real, but the deity itself can’t be proven or disproven.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
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Vonsalza:
In fairness, you also need to remember that love itself is an abstract humanist concept that also lacks a whiff of proof as it pertains to the empiricism your worldview consistently invokes.

The irony of this always delights me.

God must pass a material standard, but not love. 😂
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I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Love empirically exists. I’ve felt it.
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That’s food for thought there.
“I feel, therefore it is.”
Not very satisfying.
 
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