What Is the Fruit of Love?

“What is love?” is consistently ranked as one of the most frequently asked questions in the history of internet searches. Given how much this subject pervades our culture, this is perhaps not particularly surprising. Whether it is in the music we write, or the art we create, or the films we produce, love is a dominant and recurring theme. Yet it is also an elusive reality for many. Broken relationships, dashed affections, and unrealized dreams, along with loneliness and a myriad of relational disappointments, all mean that the love we so long for is rarely enjoyed.

Love is also a dominant and recurring theme in the Bible. God is love (1 John 4:8) and He so loved the world He gave His only Son (John 3:16). In addition, Jesus gave the church a new commandment—to love one another (John 13:34–35). We also have a whole chapter devoted to this great subject, a chapter that outlines the excellency, essence, and eternity of love (1 Cor. 13). Love is clearly the heartbeat of biblical religion.

That love is the heartbeat of biblical religion is affirmed in the first fruit of the Spirit. In stark contrast to the first work of the flesh, sexual immorality (Gal. 5:19), love is to mark our walking and living as Christians (Gal. 5:25). What then is this fruit of love?

First, love is a response.

Christian love is not something we initially do or feel. It is something God has done. As 1 John 4:10 declares, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he has loved us.” The movement of the gospel is from God to us. The great God of love has loved the unlovely. And He has loved us so wonderfully by giving us His beloved Son to die in our place. So, the fruit of love in the Christian is responsive to something we have first received. As recipients of the love of God in Jesus Christ, we now can and must respond with love. We love God because He has first loved us. We love each other because He first loved us. We love the lost because God first loved us.

This is why the fruit of love can never be produced outside of the rich soil of the gospel of God’s love. We need to constantly be reminded of the greatness of God’s love for us. We also need to frequently rehearse the wonder of God’s love for us. Only when we are amazed and encouraged by this love of God can we then respond by bearing the fruit of love in our own lives.

Love is also rescue.

God’s love acted. His love for lost sinners caused Him to send Jesus Christ to be our Savior. His love reached out and did what was needed to redeem us from hell, the devil, and the misery of a life lived in rebellion against Him. In so doing, God has shown us the essence of what real love is. Love is self-sacrificial. It forgets self and makes the needs of others a priority. It is also about giving and not taking. William Arthur Dunkerly expressed this so poignantly: “Love ever gives-forgives-outlives and ever stands with open hands. And while it lives, it gives. For this is love’s prerogative—to give, and give, and give.”

The fruit of love is to express this self-denying generosity to everyone we meet—to treat them as Christ has treated us, with a willing desire and intentional commitment to bless where no blessing is warranted, and to give without thought to the cost. More, it is to rescue the lost and redeem the sinner. While we cannot and need not repeat the once-for-all work of Christ on the cross, we are to echo it in all our relationships. The fruit of love is to go after the lost, to repay evil for good, and to sacrifice self for others. Love is cross-shaped, reflecting Christ’s love for us.

Finally, love is a reason.

Perhaps right now you can think of dozens of reasons to love your spouse, or children, or parents, or friends, or brothers and sisters in Christ. But what happens when you cannot think of any? Where do we go for motivation to love when there is none? The answer is that we always have this reason to love: “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11). Whatever we are feeling, and however much we are struggling to love, this is an ever-present reality: God has loved us. This is our reason for loving, and it is an abundant storehouse that will never run dry.

As our world romanticizes love to an unattainable ideal and debases love to nothing more than a passing lust, the Spirit-filled fruit of love has never been more needed. What an opportunity we have to shine a light on the eternal love of God in the gospel by relentlessly producing the fruit of love for His glory.