For some people, love is partly about emotional attraction and partly about a social exchange. It starts when two people are attracted to each other. I say nice thing about you, and you say nice things about me. This type of love thrives in fair weather, but it falls apart when the emotional attraction starts to fade or when one of the parties stops reciprocating. The Bible has a completely different take on love, as exemplified by the fourth chapter of John’s first letter:
Dear friends, we must love each other, because love comes from God, and everyone who loves is born of God, and knows God. Someone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. God demonstrated his love for us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we can live through him. Real love is not about us loving God, but him loving us. He sent his Son as the sacrifice by which our sins are forgiven. Dear friends, if God loved us so much, we must also love each other. No one has ever seen God, but if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love becomes complete in us.
This is an extraordinary kind of love, owned by a community of people for whom love is not something that you try to earn or steal, or something that you barter for with other people. It is something that you give away for nothing. The goal is not for you to get other people to love you; it is for you to love other people, particularly people whom nobody else loves.