Hate Versus Love

In today’s society, we hear a lot about hate.  “I hate this weather,” someone might say, or “I hate it when [he or she] does that [whatever that happens to be!].”  We also hear about “hate speech” and “hate crimes.”  On the other hand, we do hear a bit about love as well, when we hear someone say, “I love your shirt,” or “If two people love each other, why shouldn’t they get married [even if they are the same gender]?”  We also have heard somewhere that it’s important to “love thy neighbor,” whatever that means.  

I’m guessing that hating the weather is not really a hate crime, and I’m also guessing that loving someone’s shirt doesn’t really qualify as loving one’s neighbor.  So what do “hate” and “love” really mean?  Society uses these words a lot, and rather confusingly, but does the Bible give any clarity to the true definitions of these words?

Let’s fit some verses together to get the big picture:

“Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.  He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.  In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.”  I John 4:7-8

“We love him [God], because he first loved us.  If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?  And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.”  I John 4:19-21

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”  John 15:13

“He [the Devil] was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.”  John 8:44

“Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.”  I John 3:15

We see here that love and hate are polar opposites, because God is love, and the Devil is a murderer.  God wants to heal.  The Devil wants to destroy.  “Wait a minute,” someone will say, “God has destroyed quite a few people.  In fact, God has set up this whole world system, with all the hate and destruction in it.  Why did He do that, if He is so loving?”

The answer is that God created a perfect world, not a fallen one.  Humans are the ones whose choices changed the world from perfect to fallen.  God even created a beautiful angel, who decided on his own to become the Devil in opposition to God.  We could wonder all day why God created the angel who became the Devil, because God in His foreknowledge must have known who that angel would become, but the fact is that we just don’t know.  My best guess is that God allowed the Devil to create a contrast so that God could demonstrate which of His created beings would choose to love Him.  Remember, a choice is not a choice unless there is an alternative.  If God had made it impossible for His created beings (angels or humans) to rebel, then all His created beings would simply be His robots.

You can’t have it both ways.  Either God must create robots to serve Him, or He must create beings with free will.  The Devil exercised His free will when he rebelled against God, and those who follow the Devil do the same.  Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, God still controls the consequences of our choices.  I’ve heard people say that still makes God a tyrant, but I can’t help that.  He made the world, so He makes the rules.  I can’t make a world, and I don’t know anyone else except God who can, either, so I just live with the rules.  But I’d rather serve a powerful God of justice who can create a beautiful world with butterflies, babies, and flower petals in it, than serve a lying Devil who can’t create anything from nothing, and can only murder to get his own way.  

God defines evil.  Anything that is opposite to God and what God desires is evil.  This is where things get confused, because if people don’t believe in God, they get very upset when they are told that what they are doing is evil.  In their minds, God doesn’t exist, so the people who believe in God and talk about “good and evil” must be crazy.  The funny thing is, these people who don’t believe in “good and evil” somehow feel that it’s necessary to make up their own standard for good and evil when they say that it’s “wrong” to say someone is “evil” or “sinful.”  How come they don’t just laugh at the silly people who believe in “good and evil,” and say, “Well, whatever floats your boat”?  Maybe some do, but a lot of them don’t.  Instead they get angrier and angrier, and some of these people who don’t believe in God accuse those who do believe in God of “hate speech,” and some of them even lash out and take someone else’s life if they don’t like what that person is saying.  That sounds like murder to me.

Many of God’s created beings have turned against Him.  God is love, and loves everyone, which means He desires fellowship with everyone, but if you go over to His enemy, you declare war on Him.  If you declare war on Him and His followers, and actually murder a follower of His or any other innocent person, then your life should be forfeit, according to God’s law.  However, this is the job of government, not the job of ordinary citizens.  It’s not okay to take anyone’s life for any reason, although war is a hallmark of this fallen world.  War means that there has been some sort of rebellion against what is right, and chaos has resulted.  If justice was executed perfectly at all times, then war would not happen.

“What about the wars that Christians waged, such as the Crusades?” someone may accuse.  “Didn’t people who named the name of Christ kill others who did not believe in their religion?”  Yes, it’s happened.  But that just showed that they didn’t follow the God they said they believed in, because Jesus Christ said we should love our neighbors, not kill them.  How can you say you care for souls if you want to kill them?  God has waged war in His own person because He alone knows when someone is a lost cause, and He can do what He likes with what He has created, but unless you are Moses, Joshua or Gideon and are living in the ancient days with audible directives from God, angel hosts, and miracles like the parting and closing of the Red Sea, you must realize that the time for holy wars is not now.

Jesus taught that we should love our neighbors, and that the greatest love that anyone could have for someone else would be to lay down his or her life in service to that neighbor or friend.  Jesus, Who is God, is our greatest example of how to love someone.  God gave Himself as a sacrifice for the world when Jesus died on the cross.  Jesus died in our place so that those who believe on Him would not bear the blame for their time spent serving God’s enemy, the Devil.  God offers a program of redemption for every human individual He has created, so that no one has any excuse for following the rebellious Devil and suffering the same fate that the Devil will one day ultimately suffer (eternal destruction).  God has no pleasure in the deaths of those He has created and does not want those deaths to occur, even though He has decreed that those who follow evil will be destroyed.  By redeeming us, God has showed us His love, and expects us to show that same mercy and love to others, as we live here on the earth.

Jesus never did anything wrong, but He was hated when He was on the earth because He pointed out our faults.  Even though He was the only one on earth who should have had a right to point out our faults, many of His created beings could not stand hearing His words.  Under the influence of the Devil, they crucified Him, or committed a hate crime against Him.  Again, this is because lying and murder are the only strategies the Devil has for carrying out his own will.  What did Jesus say when He was on the cross?  “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Hate is the equivalent of murder.  A murderous attitude that wants certain people dead, their lives and influence taken away from the earth, and their souls lost, is what hating people is all about.  If you say you hate a person, then you are wishing them dead, or nonexistent.  If you hate sin, then you are wishing sin dead, or nonexistent, which might not be bad as long as you don’t hate any person who sins (because we all sin).  If you hate the weather, I guess you want the weather to die or be nonexistent -- which is sort of silly, so maybe we shouldn’t say things like that.

Love is the opposite.  Love desires life, and souls saved forever.  Love will sacrifice itself for the object of its love, if necessary.  God did all of that.  Even though He is powerful enough to  destroy, and even though He is the only one who is perfect, the only one who owns every one of us, and therefore is the only one who has the right to destroy His own creation, He is not hateful, because destruction is not something He wants.  He would rather redeem His creation.

You cannot wish people evil, no matter who they are, or desire to take their lives, and say that you are loving.  If such an attitude describes you, you must admit that you are guilty of hate.  Also admit that if you would not sacrifice yourself for a person or cause, or give of what you have for the benefit of someone else, in every circumstance, then you do not really love that person or cause.   (I don’t think we really love everything we say we do, so maybe we shouldn’t use the word “love” so carelessly.)

Hate is not just strongly disagreeing with someone.  Love is not just strongly liking something.

Murder equals hate.  Beneficence, self-sacrifice, and forgiveness equal love.