What is Love?

I was flipping through the channels a while ago when I fell upon an interview with a starlet who had just gone through a divorce. I normally would have blown right by the program on my way to ESPN, but something she said caught my attention. The interviewer asked her how she was coping with being alone again, to which she responded, “Nothing lasts forever, much less love.”

I wanted to protest, to clarify her grievous misunderstanding of what love is and what it can do, but the television is, unfortunately, a one-way communication device. She could not hear me.

But then I started thinking about what I’ve learned about love from popular culture about love. I’ve learned that I can’t buy me love, that love can drive you crazy, that love is a long, long road, that you can be love sick, love drunk and a soldier of love, that love stinks, that all is love, and that all you need is love. Sometimes, though, you don’t get any real answer in popular culture about love. Instead, you get a question: What is Love? (Baby don’t hurt me, baby don’t hurt me, no more.)

That’s not a very deep understanding of what love is. So, I decided that I would look to God’s revealed word to find out what He has to say about love. Even there, though, I didn’t get a definitive answer. The scriptures use the word love in so many different contexts, such as the following:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting live” (John 3:16).

“Jesus saith unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord they God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matt. 22:37-39).

“And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell the of” (Gen. 22:2).

“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it” (Eph. 5:25).

“That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children” (Titus 2:4).

“And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her” (Gen. 29:20).

The word love cannot mean exactly the same thing in all of these passages. The love God has for us is not exactly the same as the love we should have for Him. The love someone has for a neighbor is not exactly the same the love shared between a husband and wife, while the love the husband and wife have for their children is different still. And the love that Jacob had for Rachel is the kind of love that all of us single people are looking for. Is it any wonder that someone might be confused about love, when it can be used in so many different contexts?

I found a quote from Gordon B. Hinckley in his book Standing For Something. He says, “If the world is to be improved, the process of love must make a change in the hearts of humans. It can do so when we look beyond self to give our love to God and others, and do so with all our hearts, with all our souls, and all our minds.

“As we look with love and gratitude to God, and as we serve others with no apparent recompense for ourselves, there will come a greater sense of service toward our fellow human beings, less thinking of self and more reaching out to others. This principle of love is the basic essence of goodness” (p. 9).

That definition of love sounded a lot like the definition of charity, which is the pure love of Christ. It is a selflessness that can enhance every kind of relationship. God sacrificed His Son as a selfless act for us, His children. We obey His commandments out of love, not only because we want the promised blessings if we do. Husbands and wives should serve one another and they should both sacrifice to satisfy their children’s temporal and spiritual needs. And any service rendered for a loved one should seem like a small price, just as Jacob’s seven years of service seemed to him but a few days.

This kind of love doesn’t seem like the kind of love that pop culture talks about. It seems like so much more. And as Mormon wrote to his son, Moroni, it is far more enduring that whatever that starlet felt for her ex-husband. “I am filled with charity,” he writes, “which is an everlasting love” (Moroni 8:17).

Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone!