What is love?

"What is love?" was famously asked by the artist Haddaway in his 1993 hit of the same name. Now that this earworm will be with you the rest of the day (you're welcome), let's consider his question. The English language makes this quite a challenging one to answer. 

I love my mom.

I love Thai food.

I love my dog, Gus. 

I love Lady Vols basketball and Red Sox baseball.

I love my kids. 

I love a warm spring day with the windows down and loud 90s country music. 

When we talk of sex, we often use the euphemism "make love," as if we could manufacture love through an action. 

We're told, "It's better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all."

The Apostle John tells us, "God so loved the world that he sent his only Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life." 

Haddaway seems to answer his question, "What is love?" in the following line when he declares, "Baby, don't hurt me, don't hurt me no more." Does love mean never getting hurt again?

The book (and movie) Love Story declares, "Love means never having to say you're sorry." So, is it love when the other person knows you so well that they can assume your intentions toward them are always good and apologies are no longer needed?

Surely the word "love" does not mean the same thing in all of those statements, but we use the same word and assume we know what others mean when they say they love something.

But we can no longer assume any meaning is universally understood, and using more nuanced language, even about love, would go a long way in better understanding ourselves and others. 

CS Lewis and The Four Loves

So much of what C.S. Lewis wrote is rich with a prophetic tone, and his work on love is no different. Lewis anticipated the direction of society toward increased polarization, with arguments falling into love, hate, and other all-or-nothing categories. Lewis dives deeply into the four types of love described by the Greeks to combat this tendency. 

We're going to use this same structure to regain some nuance for our conversation about love leading up to the 2023 Revoice conference, Made for Love. Over the next four weeks, we'll examine "love" as Affection, Friendship, Eroticism, and Unconditional or Sacrificial. But before we do that, there's one point we must address: this is not a progression, as if each one on the list is better than the one before it. 

Some Foundational Thoughts

This myth of love that romantic or erotic love is somehow better than Friendship is just that– a myth. They are different, and one is not inherently better than the other. Romantic love isn't a "level up" from Friendship. Contrary to what When Harry Met Sally taught a generation, people can be "just" friends, even if romantic or sexual attraction might be present. 

I catch myself falling for this myth frequently when watching television because I was raised to assume that the guy and the girl (because Hollywood is SO heteronormative, am I right?) who have obvious chemistry are, of course, going to end up together. This was the main storyline for so many shows– Sam and Diane (Cheers), Ross and Rachel (Friends), Meredith and McDreamy (Gray's Anatomy), Bones and Booth (Bones), Leslie and Ben (Parks and Rec)– you get the point. I've recently realized just how ingrained this expectation is because Hollywood has finally started writing shows where the guy and the girl don't ever get together romantically. I keep thinking, "THIS is the moment they stare into each other's eyes and collapse into a passionate kiss, unable to resist the chemistry a second longer," and then it never happens. The leading characters lead the show with no romantic storyline. Their relationships deepen with time. Genuine love, trust, intimacy, and even physical Affection evolve between them, yet their relationship isn't destined to become "true love."

When we're trained to look for that in our entertainment, it's no wonder so many of us think that's how relationships should work. We assume that the more we love a friend who happens to be of the gender we are sexually or romantically attracted to, the greater the chance it will naturally evolve into romantic or sexual love. For those of us who grew up in the church AND experience same-sex attraction, this myth led to a lot of panic, anxiety, and loneliness because we would cut off friendships rather than risk them becoming sinful in thought or action. 

With all of this in mind, let's start this journey together with a couple of assumptions: 

1. Each of these loves could be seen side-by-side with one another, not on one scale of progression. They can co-exist, but it is not inevitable that they progress from one to another. 

2. Each of these loves can grow and deepen in familiarity and intimacy, moving us toward community like what is seen in the Trinity. On the other hand, they can also become twisted into counterfeit forms of intimacy and community that ultimately cannot fulfill our God-given need for those things. In other words, love can be seen as morally neutral, and what we decide to do with it determines whether or not it is righteous and God-glorifying. 

Affection: The Foundational Love

Let's jump into the first love Lewis tackles, the one the Greeks called "storge," but Lewis calls Affection. Here are some of the ways he describes this form of love; he says, "Its objects have to be familiar. We can sometimes point to the very day and hour when we fell in love or began a new friendship. I doubt if we ever catch Affection beginning (p. 33)." Lewis further states, "It ignores the barriers of age, sex, class, and education…[there is] amazing heterogeneity possible between those bound by Affection (p.33)." 

By its nature, Affection generally occurs through the passage of time. It's how, Lewis argues, we develop a love for people and things unlike ourselves. Affection commonly develops for people and things who we must be around without much choice of our own. Lewis points out that we often do not realize our love for the person or thing until they are removed from our lives. They are taken for granted and often unappreciated. "The special glory of Affection," he declares, "is that it can unite those who most emphatically, even comically, are not ["made for one another"]; people who, if they had not found themselves by fate in the same household or community, would have had nothing to do with each other (pg. 36)."

The Church is one place in which the world should witness this most emphatic and comical Affection amongst people who could only be gathered by their love for Jesus and one another. I've often said, "it will be a good day for the Church when someone could walk in, look at those in attendance, and demand an answer to the question, "What could possibly bring these people together???" Affection could, and possibly should, demand a telling of the Gospel. 

At the same time, Affection could, and possibly should, be the foundation for all other loves. One could say other "loves" are possible without Affection, but they are not sustainable without it. What better place to grow romantic or sexual love than on a foundation of trust and reliable familiarity? Are not friendships best when they possess these same qualities? 

An example of Friendship being bolstered by Affection in my life is my relationship with two of my dearest college friends. We were friends first, brought together by similar upbringings in the religious South, similar interests, and the fact that we lived on the same floor in our residence hall. But over the years, our lives have taken very different paths, and it is the Affection for one another that has developed over the last twenty-two years that maintains our Friendship. 

Lewis further dives into Affection's dark and twisty side, but we will not delve into that this week. If you are interested in his discussion of toxic aspects of Affection, I encourage you to buy the book The Four Loves from your favorite independent bookseller. Next week we'll move on to the next love Lewis addresses: Friendship.