What Real Love Actually Means
Have you ever someone tell you that if you really loved them, you’d agree with what they believe? In Western culture, disagreement gets read as rejection these days, even when it’s offered gently. That’s had me asking myself what real love actually means, and whether affirmation and love are even the same thing?
If you’d rather listen or watch this one, you can catch the full message on the podcast or on YouTube.
What Real Love Looks Like in Scripture
We tend to read 1 Corinthians 13 at weddings, but Paul wasn’t writing to a bride and groom. He was writing to a church in Corinth that was in a fight. They were arguing over spiritual maturity and who had it more figured out.
Right in the middle of that mess, Paul says love does not insist on its own way, is not irritable or resentful, and does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.
If we look closely at the original language and it gets even more specific. Being resentful is described as an accounting term, keeping a mental ledger of wrongs. And that word for rejoice shows up twice in one verse in two different forms, a personal joy and a shared one.
Love refuses to gloat over what’s wrong and it clings to what’s true, together with other people, not alone.
The Doorway and the Table
Consider this picture to help you think through what real love means in everyday conversation:
- A doorway demands agreement before you’re let in. Affirm the right beliefs, celebrate the right choices, or you don’t get past the threshold.
- A table works differently. You sit down, you talk, you disagree sometimes, and you’re still welcome. Acceptance isn’t tied to whether everyone agrees.
Love is found at a table conversation, not a doorway affirmation. That’s the whole message in one line, and it’s worth sitting with.
Why Honesty Doesn’t Cost What We Fear
A major review of self-esteem research found that constant praise, regardless of whether it’s earned, doesn’t reliably make people better off. It just props up a self-image that gets fragile fast.
- Roy F. Baumeister, Jennifer D. Campbell, Joachim I. Krueger, and Kathleen D. Vohs, “Does High Self-Esteem Cause Better Performance, Interpersonal Success, Happiness, or Healthier Lifestyles?” Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 4(1), 2003, 1-44, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/1529-1006.01431
Separate research out of the University of Chicago and Carnegie Mellon asked people to be completely honest in every conversation for three days straight. Before starting, they assumed it would hurt their relationships. It didn’t. Honesty turned out to be more enjoyable and more connecting than anyone predicted.
- Emma E. Levine and Taya R. Cohen, “You Can Handle the Truth: Mispredicting the Consequences of Honest Communication,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 147(9), 2018, 1400-1429, https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000488
We avoid the honest conversation because we assume it’ll cost us. The evidence says otherwise.
Grace and Truth, Held Together
Near the start of this series, we looked at John 1:14, where Jesus is described as full of grace and truth. Not one traded for the other. Both, fully, at once.
That’s the same kind of love Paul is describing to the Corinthian Church…and to us!
Join the Conversation; Answer This Question
- Where have you confused staying quiet with showing love?
- What would it look like to bring honesty into that relationship instead?
