“Love” in English does far too much work — I love my kids, I love dumplings. When I started reading the Bible I wanted to know what it meant by the word, and the answer turned out to depend on who was speaking and to whom. Some of these verses are about how God loves; some are instructions to a church that was fighting; a few are about marriage; one is a widow’s promise to her mother-in-law.
Forty verses in the NIV, in three groups, each with a line or two about where it comes from. My notes as a curious outsider, with the commentaries I used listed at the end.
How God loves
1. John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. — John 3:16 (NIV)
Said to Nicodemus, a religious leader who came to Jesus at night (3:1-2). “So loved” means loved in this way — and the way is the giving. It is the verse Christians quote first about God’s love because it names the cost.
2. Romans 5:8
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. — Romans 5:8 (NIV)
The order matters: “while we were still sinners.” Paul’s point is that the love came before any improvement, which is what makes it love rather than a reward.
3. 1 John 4:9-10
This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. — 1 John 4:9-10 (NIV)
John’s definition: “not that we loved God, but that he loved us.” The direction of the arrow is the whole argument of the chapter.
4. 1 John 4:19
We love because he first loved us. — 1 John 4:19 (NIV)
Five words in English. Enduring Word’s note: God’s love “initiates, and we respond” — it is also, they add, the answer to the question of how to love God more.
5. Romans 8:38-39
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. — Romans 8:38-39 (NIV)
Paul’s list of everything that cannot separate a person from God’s love, written to Christians in Rome who would soon face persecution under Nero. “Nor anything else in all creation” closes every loophole.
6. Jeremiah 31:3
The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. — Jeremiah 31:3 (NIV)
Said to a nation in exile that assumed God was done with it. “Everlasting love” and “unfailing kindness” — the second phrase is the Hebrew hesed, loyal covenant love.
7. Zephaniah 3:17
The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.” — Zephaniah 3:17 (NIV)
Nearly all of Zephaniah is judgment; then the last chapter turns. God “will rejoice over you with singing” — Enduring Word passes on Spurgeon’s observation that God is never said to sing over creation, only over his people.
8. Ephesians 2:4-5
But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. — Ephesians 2:4-5 (NIV)
“Because of his great love for us… made us alive” — the love is the cause and the life is the effect, written to churches around Ephesus.
9. Psalm 136:1
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever. — Psalm 136:1 (NIV)
A responsive psalm: every one of its 26 verses ends “His love endures forever,” probably with a leader calling out the line and the congregation answering. “Love” here is hesed again — Enduring Word describes it as loyal covenant love combined with real compassion.
10. Lamentations 3:22-23
Because of the Lord ’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. — Lamentations 3:22-23 (NIV)
Written in a burned city. The “great love” that keeps the writer from being consumed is the same hesed word, and it is said to be “new every morning” — a daily supply, not a stockpile.
11. 1 John 3:1
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. — 1 John 3:1 (NIV)
“See what great love the Father has lavished on us” — the verb pictures pouring out without measuring. The result named is a family status: “children of God.”
12. Psalm 86:15
But you, Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness. — Psalm 86:15 (NIV)
David is quoting the description God gave of himself to Moses on Sinai (Exodus 34:6) — “compassionate and gracious… slow to anger, abounding in love.” It’s the most-repeated self-description of God in the Old Testament, which is why David leans on it in a prayer for help.
Loving one another
13. Matthew 22:37-39
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ — Matthew 22:37-39 (NIV)
Asked which commandment is greatest, Jesus joins two Old Testament lines — Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 — and says the second “is like” the first. Loving neighbor is not a lesser rule.
14. John 13:34-35
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” — John 13:34-35 (NIV)
Spoken at the Last Supper, right after Jesus washed the disciples’ feet. Enduring Word notes that “new” here means fresh rather than recently invented; what is new is the standard: “as I have loved you.”
15. John 15:12-13
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. — John 15:12-13 (NIV)
Same evening. “Lay down one’s life for one’s friends” — spoken by someone who would do exactly that within a day.
16. 1 John 4:7-8
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. — 1 John 4:7-8 (NIV)
“God is love” — Enduring Word is careful here: this describes God’s character and colors everything else about him, but it does not cancel his holiness or justice.
17. 1 John 4:11-12
Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. — 1 John 4:11-12 (NIV)
“No one has ever seen God” — and the way the invisible God becomes visible, John says, is Christians loving one another.
18. 1 John 3:18
Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. — 1 John 3:18 (NIV)
Love “with actions and in truth,” not only “with words or speech.” John has just used the example of someone with possessions who sees a brother in need and does nothing (3:17).
19. 1 Peter 4:8
Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. — 1 Peter 4:8 (NIV)
“Love covers over a multitude of sins” — Peter is quoting Proverbs 10:12. Enduring Word reads it as covering the sins of both the one loving and the one loved.
20. Romans 12:9-10
Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. — Romans 12:9-10 (NIV)
“Love must be sincere” — literally, without hypocrisy (the Greek word for an actor’s mask). Then a race to the bottom in the best sense: “honor one another above yourselves.”
21. Romans 13:8
Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. — Romans 13:8 (NIV)
A debt you never finish paying. Paul has just told the Romans to pay their taxes (13:6-7), and then names the one obligation that stays open.
22. Galatians 5:13-14
You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” — Galatians 5:13-14 (NIV)
Paul has spent four chapters insisting Christians are free from the law, then says the freedom is for serving one another, and that the whole law is kept in one sentence from Leviticus.
23. Ephesians 4:2-3
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. — Ephesians 4:2-3 (NIV)
“Bearing with one another in love” — the verb means to put up with. It is a surprisingly unromantic definition of love and probably the most useful one for family life.
24. Colossians 3:14
And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. — Colossians 3:14 (NIV)
After a list of virtues to “put on” like clothing, love goes “over all” — the outer garment that holds the rest together.
25. 1 Corinthians 16:14
Do everything in love. — 1 Corinthians 16:14 (NIV)
Four words at the end of a long, hard letter to a church that argued about everything: “Do everything in love.”
26. Luke 6:27-28
“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. — Luke 6:27-28 (NIV)
“Love your enemies… pray for those who mistreat you.” Luke’s version of the hardest command, given to people under Roman occupation.
27. Hebrews 10:24
And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, — Hebrews 10:24 (NIV)
“Spur one another on” — the Greek word is usually negative, a provocation. Here it’s turned to good: provoke each other toward love.
28. 1 Peter 1:22
Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart. — 1 Peter 1:22 (NIV)
“Love one another deeply” — the adverb pictures something stretched to its full extent. Written to scattered, pressured Christians who needed each other.
Marriage, family, and friendship
29. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. — 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (NIV)
Written to a church splitting into factions (1:10-12) and competing over spiritual gifts (chapters 12-14), not to a couple. Every item is something love does or refuses to do — patient, kind, not envious, keeps no record of wrongs. Read it with a church fight in mind and it sharpens.
30. 1 Corinthians 13:13
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. — 1 Corinthians 13:13 (NIV)
Faith, hope, and love remain; “the greatest of these is love.” Paul has just said prophecy and knowledge will pass away (13:8).
31. Genesis 2:24
That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh. — Genesis 2:24 (NIV)
The first statement about marriage in the Bible — leave, unite, one flesh — quoted by Jesus (Matthew 19:5) and Paul (Ephesians 5:31).
32. Song of Songs 8:6-7
Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot sweep it away. If one were to give all the wealth of one’s house for love, it would be utterly scorned. — Song of Songs 8:6-7 (NIV)
The climax of the Bible’s love poem. “Love is as strong as death… many waters cannot quench love.” The book never mentions God by name, and is in the Bible anyway.
33. Ephesians 5:21
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. — Ephesians 5:21 (NIV)
The sentence that opens the marriage passage: “submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” Enduring Word spends most of its space here on what mutual submission looks like in practice — thinking of others, being a “team player” — before the instructions to wives and husbands begin.
34. Ephesians 5:25
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her — Ephesians 5:25 (NIV)
Husbands are told to love “just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” The model is self-giving, not leadership for its own sake.
35. Ephesians 5:33
However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. — Ephesians 5:33 (NIV)
Paul’s one-sentence summary of the passage: love from the husband, respect from the wife — “each one of you also.”
36. Colossians 3:19
Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. — Colossians 3:19 (NIV)
The same instruction to husbands with a plain addition: “do not be harsh with them.” Paul apparently thought it needed saying.
37. Proverbs 17:17
A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity. — Proverbs 17:17 (NIV)
“A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity.” Friendship is measured by what it does when things go wrong.
38. Proverbs 10:12
Hatred stirs up conflict, but love covers over all wrongs. — Proverbs 10:12 (NIV)
“Love covers over all wrongs” — the line Peter quotes in 1 Peter 4:8, contrasted with hatred, which “stirs up conflict.”
39. Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. — Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 (NIV)
“Two are better than one… if either of them falls down, one can help the other up.” The Teacher’s practical case for companionship, continued in verse 12’s cord of three strands.
40. Ruth 1:16-17
But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” — Ruth 1:16-17 (NIV)
Ruth, a Moabite widow, speaking to Naomi, her Israelite mother-in-law, on the road out of Moab. Read at weddings, but it’s a daughter-in-law’s vow, and it ends with a curse on herself if she breaks it.
Agape, philia, and the limits of the word study
Every Christian book on love explains that Greek has several words for it: agape (the one the New Testament uses most, usually described as love that chooses the other’s good), philia (friendship affection), and eros (desire, which the New Testament doesn’t use). The distinction is real and useful. It is also easy to overstate. In John 21:15-17, Jesus asks Peter twice if he loves him using agapaō, and Peter answers with phileō; Enduring Word notes that some commentators see no significant difference between the two words in that passage, while most think Peter was being more reserved after his denial. The safe conclusion is that the words overlap, and the Bible’s definition of love is given by what it describes — 1 Corinthians 13, John 13, 1 John 4 — more than by vocabulary.
What I noticed reading these together
Almost none of the “love” verses are about feelings. 1 Corinthians 13 is a list of behaviors. Ephesians 4:2 defines love as putting up with people. 1 John 3:18 says actions, not words. The one passage that is unmistakably about romantic feeling, Song of Songs, is a poem rather than an instruction. For a mom, that turned out to be good news: the standard isn’t to feel warmly toward a toddler at 5 a.m., it’s to be patient with one.
The other thing: the Bible’s two great commandments (Matthew 22:37-39) put love of God and love of neighbor side by side, and 1 John 4:20 says a person who claims the first without the second is lying. Whatever else Christians disagree about, the texts don’t allow love of God to be a private matter.
Sources
- 1 Corinthians 13 (NIV) on BibleGateway
- Enduring Word — 1 Corinthians 13 commentary
- Enduring Word — 1 John 4 commentary
- Enduring Word — John 13 commentary
- Enduring Word — John 21 commentary
- Enduring Word — Psalm 136 commentary
- Blue Letter Bible — 1 Corinthians 13:4 with lexicon tools
- GotQuestions — What is agape love?
- GotQuestions — What does it mean that God is love?
Questions moms ask
What is the most famous Bible verse about love?
What does agape mean?
Which Bible verses about love are read at weddings?
Scripture references in this article
Each reference opens the full passage on BibleGateway (NIV).
- John 3:16
- Romans 5:8
- 1 John 4:9-10
- 1 John 4:19
- Romans 8:38-39
- Jeremiah 31:3
- Zephaniah 3:17
- Ephesians 2:4-5
- Psalm 136:1
- Lamentations 3:22-23
- 1 John 3:1
- Psalm 86:15
- Exodus 34:6
- Matthew 22:37-39
- Deuteronomy 6:5
- Leviticus 19:18
- John 13:34-35
- John 15:12-13
- 1 John 4:7-8
- 1 John 4:11-12
- 1 John 3:18
- 1 Peter 4:8
- Proverbs 10:12
- Romans 12:9-10
- Romans 13:8
- Galatians 5:13-14
- Ephesians 4:2-3
- Colossians 3:14
- 1 Corinthians 16:14
- Luke 6:27-28
- Hebrews 10:24
- 1 Peter 1:22
- 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
- 1 Corinthians 13:13
- Genesis 2:24
- Matthew 19:5
- Ephesians 5:31
- Song of Songs 8:6-7
- Ephesians 5:21
- Ephesians 5:25
- Ephesians 5:33
- Colossians 3:19
- Proverbs 17:17
- Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
- Ruth 1:16-17
- John 21:15-17
- Ephesians 4:2
- 1 John 4:20
- 1 Corinthians 13:4
Little helps for everyday faith
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Behind the notes
Hi, I'm Vega.
I'm a curious mom in Taiwan reading the Bible and writing down what I learn. I'm not a Christian — I grew up Buddhist — but after watching my aunt and the moms around me lean on these words through hard years, I wanted to understand why they carry so much weight. Every verse is quoted from the ESV or NIV and every interpretation links to a public commentary. I'm still learning; if you spot an error, tell me.
A little more about me