God is love, has love for humankind, and manifests this love in the natural realm to all men, as well as to His elect in the covenant of grace. God requires love in His law—His law being comprehended in the one word love. The objects of love are God and one’s neighbor. For that purpose the law has been recorded upon two tables of stone. On the first is recorded how and in which way we are to manifest our love toward God, and on the second is recorded the manner how and in which way we are to manifest our love toward our neighbor. It is the latter we now wish to discuss.
Love is the congenial frame of heart of God’s children, wrought of God, whereby their heart is engaged with desires to have harmonious fellowship with their neighbor, and to seek their welfare as well as their own.
Love is a congenial frame of the heart. Among all virtues, love is the most eminent, pure, and delightful; it is a disposition of the heart. The acts of thinking, speaking, and any other activities are not love itself—even though these actions may issue forth from love—for such actions can also take place apart from love. Rather, the very disposition of the heart is loving and it has a propensity toward love. It is thoroughly permeated with love, and it finds delight in being thus disposed. There can be motions in the heart of aversion, anger, and pity, which, even if they were not sinful, engender some measure of grief. However, love is radiant, sweet, and joyous in nature, and the stronger this propensity and the more powerful its manifestation, the greater its sweetness will be.
The subject or the seat of love is to be found in the heart of the children of God. After the fall, man in his natural state is “hateful, and hating” (Titus 3:3). He has the ability to love, for this is a human characteristic; however, he distorts it by focusing upon the wrong object and by using it in a faulty manner. Man intensely loves himself, and he only loves that from which he can derive pleasure for himself. He hates and has an aversion for whatever is not subservient to this or is against him. An unconverted person is not a true lover of his neighbor; however, regeneration changes the heart of God’s children and thereby they begin to love their neighbor in the right manner. Regeneration reforms man according to the image of God, and Christ is formed in them. Since God is love, someone who is a partaker of the divine nature consequently also has love—that is, according to the measure in which he is a partaker of the divine nature. The congregation of Colosse had love for all the saints (Col 1:4), and the congregation of the Thessalonians was “taught of God to love one another” (1 Thess 4:9). The heart is the essential seat of all virtues, and this is therefore also true for love. “Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart” (1 Tim 1:5). Since the image of God resides in the heart, love likewise resides in the heart. It does not remain hidden there, however, for if the heart is aflame within, that flame will leap forth to the outside.
The object of this love is one’s neighbor; that is, all who are of one blood and have come forth from one and the same Adam. We are to consider man as either presently having the image of God, or as man, or as a sinner in an unconverted state. Furthermore, we can distinguish between various relationships: parents, children, sisters and brothers, relatives, or strangers. They are all the objects of love. The exception here is when we note sinners as sinners; however, as human beings they continue to be the object of love in a general sense—not only to do good to them, but to love them, and thus to let our benevolence issue forth from that. Since there is such variety regarding types of neighbors, and the relationships to them, love will be expressed differently to the one than to the other.
The Essence of Love
The very essence of love is that it is relational in nature. Man is a social being who desires to have fellowship and communion with his fellow man. In this respect we can view love as:
(1) The singular desire of having fellowship with a human being. A person would be more dead than alive if he were alone in the world or on an island—all hope being cut off of ever seeing or hearing a human being.
(2) Affection. There can be matters in another person’s life which may or must rightfully prevent us from having familiar fellowship with him. Being hindered in doing so is grievous, however, and one would desire that this hindrance be removed—be it that he would be converted, or that a given sin (being an impediment to spiritual communion and continually putting us in danger of being polluted) would not manifest itself so strongly in him. We shall, however, love him in spite of this, and the desire for fellowship remains. We shall make a wholehearted effort to do good to him in body and soul, and must rejoice when he prospers and grieve when it goes ill with him. It is thus that Paul loved Israel—presently unbelieving and striving against the truth—according to the flesh: “Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved” (Rom 10:1). Thus, we must even love our enemies—those who are hostile and manifest enmity toward us (Matt 5:44).
(3) Good will; that is, if we are fully one with our neighbor in the mutual enjoyment of delight, pleasure, and happiness. God is the primary and preeminent object of love. Love toward all those in whom there is some resemblance of God flows forth out of this love for God. The greater this resemblance, the greater this love will be. In addition to this there is God’s command to love, which He gives us in order that we find our delight in this. Even though the angels resemble God to a higher degree than men of this earth do, they nevertheless do not qualify as our neighbors—and are thus not to be loved as such. Therefore, the love of good will flows both from the love to God and from a love for compliance with the commands of God. The one who loves will thus unite himself with this object with pleasure and delight: “Every one that loveth Him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of Him” (1 John 5:1). This love not only manifests itself in esteem for the regenerate, but it also strives to be united with them. The nature of love is such that it establishes a union. Therefore the apostle calls love, “the bond of perfectness” (Col 3:14), and in Col 2:2 he says, “That their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love.” It is thus written concerning the first church, “And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul” (Acts 4:32). Christ prays for this: “That they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us” (John 17:21). This love of good will only exists between believers, since they believe of each other that God loves them, and that they love God. This love is called brotherly love: “Let brotherly love continue” (Heb 13:1). This is not to suggest that the godly only manifest love to the godly, but the reasons for exercising the love of good will are only to be found in them. When the basis for such love is not to be found in others, the godly can also not love them in this manner. Nevertheless, they love the unregenerate with the love of affection, seeking their welfare, doing to them all that love requires toward such an object, manifesting nevertheless in all their dealings the incompatibility and difference between them and the godly. The apostle does not want us to limit ourselves to love for the godly only, but our love must also extend to others. “… to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity”1 (2 Pet 1:7). Wherever there is a loving heart, it will manifest itself toward every object in which something loveable is to be found, or toward those concerning whom God has obligated them in some measure.