Love Isn’t a Feeling. It’s a Covenant
We have been lied to. Lied to by culture. Lied to by cowardly pulpits. Lied to by the loud, spineless voices of emotionalism masquerading as love. And worst of all, we have allowed these lies to replace the Gospel definition of love with a counterfeit that exalts feelings over obedience and sentiment over sacrifice.
Love is not how you feel. Love is how you stay.
The dichotomy between love and feelings is this. Love remains when feelings fail. That is the Gospel. That is the cross. That is the covenant.
Jesus did not feel like going to the cross. He wept blood in the garden. He pleaded with the Father for another way. Every feeling in His human body screamed for escape. But love said stay. Love said obey. Love said give all.
If we preach a Gospel that builds a house on the shaky sand of emotions, we will continue to raise up believers who run every time their feelings shift. And they will call that wisdom. They will say the Spirit told them to leave. But the Spirit does not contradict Scripture. The Spirit never told anyone to abandon covenant because their feelings were hurt. The Spirit leads us into all truth, and the truth is that love costs you everything.
We say God is love. And He is. But what does that mean? That He feels good about us all the time? That He agrees with our broken logic or our wounded sense of self worth? No. It means that He made a covenant that cannot be broken. It means He gave Himself even when we were spitting in His face. Love held Him to the cross when every feeling would have told Him to walk away.
Love is not emotional alignment. Love is sacrificial agreement.
We need to kill the idea that our feelings have the authority to determine our obedience. We are a generation that thinks saying I feel led is the same as saying God said. No. The Spirit will never contradict the written Word, and the written Word says this:
“If you love me, you will obey my commands.
John 14:15
Feelings are fickle. They are servants, not masters. Love is a Person. And that Person is holy. That Person is not double minded. That Person is not swayed by offense. That Person does not bail out of covenant because someone hurt His feelings.
Love says Father forgive them, not Father forget them.
But we have made love soft, sentimental, and spineless. We have wrapped it in the language of tolerance, disguised it as passivity, and made it a hostage to our emotions. We no longer see love as a crucifixion. We see it as a comfort.
And the church is paying for it.
We have believers leaving their marriages, churches, and callings because they do not feel in love anymore. They do not feel connected. They do not feel passionate. And so they break covenant and call it growth.
But love that leaves was never love at all.
Love does not leave when things get hard. Love does not walk away when it is not reciprocated. Love does not submit to feelings. Love subdues them.
You want to know what real love is? Look at Jesus. Hanging naked, beaten, mocked, bleeding. Not a goosebump in sight. No emotional high. No spiritual fireworks. Just the will of the Father and the fullness of love pouring out of His veins.
He felt nothing like love. But He was love.
We have confused love with chemistry. With connection. With affirmation. But love is not a vibe. Love is not an alignment of desires. Love is a violent choice to lay down your life for another.
This is why we have so many spiritual orphans. So many people church hopping, relationship hopping, ministry hopping. Because the second their feelings are not stroked, they assume love is gone. But love never had to be felt to be real.
The Gospel is not emotional compatibility. The Gospel is covenant faithfulness.
Love says, even if you betray me, I will serve you.
Love says, even when I do not feel seen, I will keep showing up.
Love says, even when this costs me everything, I will stay because I already died.
That is what Jesus modeled. That is what Paul preached. That is what the early church bled for.
But we are raising up believers who think love is validated by a goosebump in worship or an easy relationship dynamic. We think love means I agree with you or you do not make me uncomfortable. No. Love confronts. Love disciplines. Love endures.
“Love suffers long”
1 Corinthians 13:4
Let that wreck you. Love suffers. Not once. Not for a moment. Love suffers long.
That means love does not quit. Love does not flinch. Love does not get tired and walk away.
Our feelings are allowed to speak. But they are not allowed to lead.
You will not always feel love toward your spouse. Your leader. Your friend. Your brother. But the absence of feelings is not the absence of love. Love is revealed in the choice to stay, to serve, to honor, and to obey even when the feelings are absent.
In fact, I would argue that the truest measure of love is found when the feelings are gone and the covenant still stands.
If you only love when it feels good, then you have not yet met the crucified Christ.
If you only stay when it serves you, you have not been discipled by Jesus.
If you only obey when it makes sense, you are still living on the throne of self.
But when you surrender that throne, when you give up the right to be driven by emotions, when you choose faithfulness over feelings, then you will begin to understand the Gospel.
The Gospel is not a good feeling. It is a good death.
Jesus did not come to make you feel loved. He came to make you love. And that love will cost you.
It will cost you pride.
It will cost you preference.
It will cost you comfort.
It will cost you the right to be offended.
It will cost you the illusion of control.
Because love is cruciform. Love does not feel good. Love is good.
So when you wake up one day and do not feel love toward God, toward your spouse, toward your assignment, remember this. Love was never based on your feelings to begin with.
Love was based on the blood.
And the blood does not change with the weather.
The blood speaks a better word. The blood remains. The blood makes a covenant that your feelings cannot touch.
Stop confusing emotions for truth. Stop confusing goosebumps for obedience. Stop mistaking feeling loved with actually being loved.
You are most loved in the moments you least feel it. Because you were most loved at the cross, and the cross did not feel like love.
It was love.
So if you are looking for something that feels good, you will never carry the weight of love.
But if you are ready to die, to lay down your feelings and take up your cross, then welcome to the real thing.
Love that bleeds.
Love that stays.
Love that never fails.
This is the Gospel. This is Jesus. This is love.
And it has nothing to do with your feelings.
If you feel led to partner with what God is doing through this ministry, we invite you to sow into this work as the Spirit leads. Your generosity helps us continue to share His love and truth with others. There is no obligation, only an opportunity to join in what God is building. Thank you for considering being a part of this journey.
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