What does true love look like?
That’s what border guards in Denmark have been trying to figure out since the Danish government began requiring them to decide if couples are enough in love to be allowed to cross the border to see each other during the Covid pandemic.
The policy stipulates that if one lovebird is from Denmark and the other is from a Nordic country or Germany, they can visit in Denmark as long as they can convince a border guard that their love is sincere and has endured for at least six months. Hard evidence is required. The couple has to recite personal information about one another and present photos, emails and text messages as proof.
However well-intentioned this plan may be, it seems a bit wonky to me. Would you seriously want Hans the burly border guard to be the one judging the depth of your love?
I’m picturing myself and my husband Joe standing on opposite sides of the Danish border back in the mid-70s when we were dating. How would we have convinced Hans we were truly in love?
Would we have shown him love letters we’d written? Would I have whipped out my guitar and sung some of the epic love songs I’d written for Joe? (Oh yes, I did too write him love songs.) Would Joe have shown Hans the odometer on his new car to prove he’d driven hundreds of miles, dozens of times, to visit me after I went away to college?
By the grace of God, Joe and I have now been married 43 years, but could Hans have predicted that?
Most of us have been exposed to countless romantic movies, songs and books throughout our lives, so surely we know what true love looks like. But do we? After all, about half of all American marriages end in divorce.
So, what DOES true love actually look like?
The shortest answer is also the truest: love looks like Jesus.
The Apostle John wrote that “God is love” and the Apostle Paul eloquently describes in 1 Corinthians 13 what love looks like. I hate algebra, but even I can do the math on this and conclude that Paul’s famous “love chapter” also gives us a picture of Jesus, God incarnate, when it describes love like this: patient, kind, not jealous, not boastful, not arrogant, not unbecoming or self-seeking, not provoked, doesn’t take into account a wrong suffered, rejoices with the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never fails.
That kind of love would be hard for a border guard to discern in a few minutes, wouldn’t it? It also swims upstream in a culture which tells us to prioritize physical beauty, financial wealth and emotions when we’re looking for “true love.”
We’re bombarded with the message that love is a feeling, but God’s definition is so much broader and deeper and is beautifully illustrated in these two familiar verses from His Word:
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
“But God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).
God is love. His character defines it and His actions display it.
A popular Etta James song talks about wanting a “Sunday kind of love” to “last past Saturday night.”
I understand the sentiment, but how sad to settle for that when God offers us an “Easter kind of love” –perfect love that moved Him to sacrifice Himself on a cross for you and me—the very ones whose sin and rebellion nailed Him up there.
That’s what love looks like.