Doing something from love is so underrated. People have been programmed to do things from selfishness, from what they want to get, from the impression they want to create, from the accolades they want to get. It seems that until you are a Christian, your motivation cannot really be purified into love.
1 John 4:7-8: Dear friends, let us love one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been fathered by God and knows God. The person who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
So whatever we have apart from God is not love. It is something else. John is making love an exclusive reality for the believer. He is talking about love from God's point of view. This is love that is only defined by how the others are going to benefit.
Love is action. But action is not necessarily love because there can be identical actions with differing motivation. God sees them differently, even though man may not be able to tell the difference. There is a pureness to God's (nothing about what He would gain) love that can only be realized in the believers who are in connection with God.
The ultimate motivation was seen in God giving His son, and we are supposed to be like God, who is love.
Therefore, Jesus said Give, expecting nothing in return.
Luke 6:35: But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to ungrateful and evil people.
We need the stream of our motivation to be purified.
Paul said love is kind, he said it is unselfish.
1 Corinthians 13:4-5: Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up. It is not rude, it is not self-serving, it is not easily angered or resentful.
Love is not self-serving. Did you hear that? Motivation is not a side issue; it is core, since God is Love; He is the definition of love motivation.
It is wrong to persuade people to serve God based on what they will gain in the immediate sense. Wrong.
Love is the linchpin of all the law and prophets, according to Jesus.
Matthew 22:37-40: Jesus said to him, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. The second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”
In Christ, our motivation can be purified. We can have the God kind of love in our hearts.
Romans 5:5: And hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
So when we love God, it is not because of us, it is in spite of us, it is because of God who has poured out His love in our hearts.
That is what makes us to not be of the world, even though we are in the world. That is what makes us a new creature, in a different class.
We are differently, we think differently. And that is also the point of persecution by the world, because we are motivated by the love of God.
Our drive is different, our needs are different.
This is part of the new life we have in Christ, making it difficult for us to be yoked with an unbeliever; that is why they think it strange that we do not follow along with them in their excesses, bondage to the lust of the flesh, and love of the world.
1 Peter 4:3-4: or the time that has passed was sufficient for you to do what the non-Christians desire. You lived then in debauchery, evil desires, drunkenness, carousing, drinking bouts, and wanton idolatries. So they are astonished when you do not rush with them into the same flood of wickedness, and they vilify you.
So you are different, as you are rooted and grounded in the love of Christ (Ephesians 3:17-19) and what you pursue, what motivates you is different because of that. But that also creates a contrast between you and the world, and that sometimes becomes the point of persecution, just as Paul is now in prison.
But Jesus warned of this beforehand that though you are full of and motivated by the love of God, you will be hated by the world.
Matthew 10:22: And you will be hated by everyone because of my name. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
