Genuine Love
“Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.”
Romans 12:9
If you have been following along, we noted that Romans 12:1-2 focuses on our relationship with God, Romans 3-8 focuses on our relationship with other believers, and Romans 12:9-21 focuses on our relationship to the watching world. In this final section Paul talks about how we are to live our lives interacting with others to glorify God most fully.
He begins by saying, “Let love be genuine.” Hearing that, we need to ask ourselves, “What does insincere love look like?” The word for “genuine” can also be translated as, “without hypocrisy.” The word here is used to describe someone who is acting the part in a play. We all know when we watch a play or a movie that the people are actors and do not really have the abilities they are portraying. Well, except for Tom Cruise, I read he is crazy and does all his own stunts. But not even he can jump from one bullet train to another going over 200 miles per hour and survive.
Sometimes we can act like we are loving people. We go through the motions, smile at the right time, say the right words, and make all the right gestures. Inwardly we know we are faking it and only pretending to love the other person. Genuine love is sincere through and through. What you see on the outside is what is genuinely feel on the inside. You are the same in front of the other person as you on at home in your most unguarded moments. This is how our love is supposed to be. If it isn’t like this, something is wrong. Our love is defective. If you find that you are only going through the motions, you need to pray to God asking him to change your heart so that you can sincerely love others deeply from the heart.
The first way that Paul tells us to love genuinely is to, “Abhor that which is evil!” Paul says, if you really want to love there are some things that you really need to hate! Sometimes love and hate go together. If you truly love God, you will want what he wants. You will love what he loves. And, you will hate what he hates. Habakkuk says of God, “You who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong… (1:13)” Does this mean that God is unable to see the evil that people do? No, what he means is that God cannot look upon sin with pleasure or approval. God hates sin and it stirs his righteous anger over sin and its effects. Christians often say, “Love the sinner and hate the sin.” Sometimes we act like we hate both the sin and the sinner. At other times, it seems like we want so much to love the sinner that we ignore the sin that is being committed. There are attitudes and behaviors that should offend us. There are activities that we should strongly oppose. Sin is a liar, and it destroys the people who commit it and those around them.
I heard a story about a mother who was checking in on her baby girl who was sick. She had been sleeping soundly but after hearing her stir she went in to check on her. She should have gone in ten minutes earlier. The child, barely able to stand, was standing in her crib holding her arms up for her mom to pick her up. The problem was the child had severe diarrhea and in the ten minutes the girl had been awake was covered from head to toe! Did that mother reject her child? Did she tell herself she wished the girl had never been born? The mother’s love did not change for that child one bit, but she hated the filth that she was covered in. That should be our attitude toward sin. We should love and want to reach out to those who are caught up in sin. However, we should hate the sin that so defiles, confuses, and corrupts people.
As much as we should abhor “what is evil; we should hold fast to what is good.” The word can be translated as, “cleave.” It comes from the word meaning, “to glue.” We should hang on tight to that which is good. When I was a kid, I didn’t know that crazy glue instantly stuck to your skin. (Unfortunately, I also didn’t know that you could take it off with nail polish remover.) As a result, I glued my thumb and index finger together and had to pry them apart slowly, painfully. We are to be lovers of what is good. We are to hold fast to it and not let go. We need to stick to it. This is the beginning of what genuine love looks like.
