"it's not real love if it's coerced"

we hear this all the time.
it's a constant refrain in theology when we try to understand how human and divine will interact.
it's stated by Christians every day as though it is an unassailable fact that should end every argument.

... but where is this in scripture?

... where is it in our daily life, for that matter?

our children don't choose their parents: but they are commanded to love them. when men and women court each other, they spend all their energy trying to bend the others will into loving them. when you have an animal in your home, as part of your family, you do everything you can to make it content and happy, trying to coerce him or her to love you - - - not ignoring it, as tho it would be wrong of you to exert some influence...

.. and then you go to church and to Bible study and firmly state 'if someone loves you because you influenced them to, it isn't real love - - loving God has to be only a completely free decision of human will alone'

... then go back home and do everything you can to influence your husband or wife to keep loving you, without thinking something is amiss if you have contributed to that response in him or her.


are we missing something here?

this thread is for Biblical evidence that our love is not real if God somehow created us to love Him or elicits that love from us with His omnipotence.

please give any such evidence, if you have it.

((i am not yet convinced this is valid, if you ain't noticed, ha!))

alternate thread title:

• why do we woo?

Yabba dabba doo.

1 John 3:16
Love simply means to value ones life about your own... THAT IS IT.

Everyone today has confused infatuation and affection with love.

If a child is going to stick a fork in an electrical socket... What is loving? To smack the fork out of the child's hand... OR To let the child do it?

If a child want to eat candy for breakfast, lunch and dinner... What is loving? To force the child to eat vegetables and meat.... OR To let the child eat as it pleases?

Love is not an emotion it is an ACTION.

The world has gone mad...
Love and Hate are ACTIONS not emotions. Hate is to put someone under you, Love is the opposite... Love is to put someone above you.

Love is not dictated on how you feel... OR how the receiver feels. It is based on what is done.

Jeremiah 17:9
First time Love is used in the Bible... It is NOT a man loving a woman... It is NOT a woman loving a child... it is NOT a child loving their mother....
It is Genesis 22:2, where it is a father's love for a son. To define love God uses a man and his son...

Revelation 3:19
If God loves you, He is going to discipline you with His rod. Have you been disciplined lately? Have you been spanked?
Everyone has replaced God with this hippy-dippy hollywood Jesus....

Hebrews 12:6
God's love is scourging and chastening.... Have you been scourged? Have you been chastened?

Let's not forget what people said Jesus was...
Matthew 16:13-14
There you have it, the people who saw Jesus face to face thought He was....
1.) John the Baptist a homeless man screaming in the wilderness telling people what they have to do..
2.) Elijah... A VERY rough man who mocked people, rebuked them to their face, cut off their heads, and much more...
3.) Jeremiah... A man who was ALONE against the world telling EVERYONE they are wrong and a brash man...

This is not the Jesus of modern Christianity... The Jesus of modern Christianity is a hippy who smiles and never says a harsh thing...
Mark 7:25-30
Could you imagine if someone called you a dog? If you asked someone for spiritual help and they called you a dog? Why most of modern Christians today would lose their mind and say the person who called them a dog "IS NOT IN GRACE" or "DOES NOT HAVE THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST" or "DOES NOT HAVE LOVE"....

THIS IS JESUS SAYING THE WOMAN IS A DOG!
And yet, Jesus loved that woman more than any of us ever have or will love anyone in our lives.

Love is an action, it is not an emotion. You can dislike someone and love them. You can be affectionate for someone and hate them.
LOVE IS AN ACTION.

Please define your terms.

Start us out with a careful and biblical definition for "love"... or we're gonna be driving a car with no steering wheel.
: )



God Bless
.

Yes, and also define "coerce" and "elicit", which are antonyms.

(My quick response:
I think the opening proposition does not contain, intrinsically, the data to give an answer for it's own genesis, it's own cause. Different causes can be equally hypothesized dependent upon one's prior theological presuppositions. So all we're doing here is going back and re-arguing the tenets of Calvinism... we merely started with a different impetus for the same old debate.)

.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 ~ Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. Now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

To be clear, I don't believe Posthuman posted this topic to be deceptive or obtuse.
He's a good guy.

I think he started this thread because he feels it genuinely makes a strong case for his views.
I might disagree on the strength of the case, but that doesn't mean it's not an interesting topic, and worth discussing.
And it certainly won't hurt us to talk more about love, and to give it more thought.


You guys have fun, and have a great week.
.

Where in the Bible does it say that children should love their parents? It does say honour and obey. Children usually love their parents spontaneously. That love can be turned to hate. Human love is not the same as God's love. God's love is unchanging.

I think you misunderstand what love is about. God wants us to love Him. That's why He created us. However, He does not coerce. Persuasion, encouragement, exhortation, "carrot and stick" are all motivators. But they are not coercion. The world hates God and so suffers terrible consequences. But God simply leaves man to his own wicked ways. (Romans 1:24) There is no coercion there!

The outward expression of love is primarily obedience. (John 14:15) Now it is possible to obey God out of fear of consequences if we do not obey. That is common with immature Christians. As we grow in Christ, we begin to see how good His will is and how bad self will is for us. This is invariably by suffering the consequences of self will. I used to fear God's will because I knew how far apart God and I were on what I wanted compared to His desire for my life. Now I fear not having God's will. I've learned a little over the last 50+ years.

God knows our condition. He does not coerce or control. He gave Adam and Eve free will and He has never rescinded that. However, God knows that we are by nature rebellious and proud, stubborn and independent. That's why we must be born again. Nothing can change the human heart. It must be replaced. And God does just that. (Ezekiel 11:19). Even then we have the habit and memory of the independent, sinful nature. God works progressively to bring us to a place where our will and God's will are in harmony. He does this in righteousness, love, and respecting man's choices.

About 30 years ago, I was about to make a terrible decision that would have had catastrophic consequences. God broke into my deep dark thoughts and said, "How could you do this to your children?" Note that there was no coercion. My car kept going. I could have gone on with my plan. But God's word brought me to my senses.

I hope that this makes sense. It does to me, anyway!

Scripture says that God is love, and this makes me wonder if people that don't believe in God also do not believe in love, and I suspect this is the root of the hate that people hold on to. It's the only thing they know that is 'real.'

A feral cat that I'd cared after since it was a born, in the lot shortly after moving in, was adequately independent and always greeted me with a hiss as soon as I even looked her way. I supposed that she wanted to make sure that I knew that she hated me first, haaa! Either that or she meant to instill fear to extort my offering of kibble to her.

I lost count of the years of this behavior toward me. She must've been about 15 years old or so, and at least some years over 10. However, I understood her sentiment supposing that, since she wasn't as cute and cuddly looking other cats, the world had seemed cold to her. But, this past summer, she finally warmed up to me enough that I could get a picture of her (I posted it on my 'little sparrow' thread, and I think I actually captured that first moment when she realized that I loved her after all (even though the salmon puree that I introduced to her might've had something to do with that epiphany; I was shocked that she didn't mind that her cheek and my hand were actually coming into contact while I squeezed it into her dish. Before that she never approached unless I withdrew myself).

Unfortunately, she expired at the first frost. Her two surviving sisters help to ease that grief somewhat but, my eyes are stinging as I think of it.

All those years that she lived, she came around for the kibble, but I hate to think how long I would've if she were still wandering if she hadn't passed inside the shelter, I had set up for them.

I have story of another, who kept her distance from me (and everybody but my son who came with me and held her when bringing her home) all of her life, until the day she fell sick and shortly afterwards passed away, and had come to me, purposefully, (my son had moved out by then) and I was able to cradle her in my arms while I washed the vomit off of her.

And I have more stories. Yep. I'm that crazy cat lady... And you can't show me any cat that I don't love, even if it doesn't believe it.

Most likely.

Re "Scripture says that God is love, and this makes me wonder if people that don't believe in God also do not believe in love, and I
suspect this is the root of the hate that people hold on to. It's the only thing they know that is 'real.'": I suspect you are right. I was blessed with loving parents who were also rather strict, so I had no problem believing in a God who was both loving and a law giver.

1 John 4:8b~ God is Love

The Bible gives many examples of people having choice.

Choice between self and selflessness.

The commandments are there for our liberty..

The laws result in love.

To force us to love is not real love.

God would not value forced love.
Forced love is not worth anything.

God loves us and we respond to that love by loving Him back.

By knowing and spending time with God our love grows.

Does God force every choice in calvanism?
Is both good and bad a result of God's sovereign power?

God first created Adam from the dust, put him in the garden to live. everything done for him to live restfully. then came Eve to be an equal made from Adam's rib, God seeing. it not good for Adam to be alone. that gave the way to reproduction of flesh
Yet, even though God rested` in contentment, saw all as good. Gave a free choice to Adam and then Eve too. Them being totally unaware of bad and good as God is totally aware of what is best, Deceived to eat from that tree of good and evil. they both ate and ran off to hide,
The Spirit of God became dead to them both. Then put out of the garden to till the ground outside of the garden for themselves to find out they are not God, they now are in the image of God, thinking they now know right from wrong and learning when are and when are not from experiences of the dead flesh nature now in them from unbelief.
God foresaw this in Genesis 3, the very first prediction of Son to us, not seen when this was written by Moses to us all
That Son would reconcile us and we would believe by God's son, Jesus we are reconciled and then accept reconciliation from God in love to us, then the new life offered begins and we get to see it, those that will continue in belief, give up these;ves completely as seen in Luke 21 to me.
God seals us, carries on the good work he starts in us. anyone, whoever comes to see it gets revealed it by God, one makes a final decision and stands in Col 1 and chapter 2, freed from under Law and then willingly does Law, not haveing to as religion preaches to do that or else attitude

I married my wife 42 years ago now, neither one of us were forced by each other or any other
We met and two weeks later we married between God and us, done

I was sick of what you mentioned in your post and so was she.
What God joins together let no other separate them

Yes free to choose and stop trying to make things be, thank you

I too believe that love is action. Because we are to love our enemies, then the word says how to love them.
yes falling in love is what we call it. We become attached to certain people. Even digging our hearts deep into each other.