What Does it Really Mean to Love God?

Discovering the Deeper Love Christ Commands

When we read Scripture, it’s easy to gloss over familiar words like “love” without grasping their deeper meaning. When Jesus commands: “'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart…”, what does He mean? Surely this is not the same kind of love we speak of in romance, friendship, or even affection for our favorite things. In everyday speech, “love” often describes emotional attachment or desire, but the love of God is something entirely different. He is calling us into a living relationship — to participate in His divine energies — so that our desires and very being are reshaped to become like Him.

Human Love vs. Divine Love

The love God asks of us is not like affection for a spouse or best friend. Natural affection, though good, is often mixed with pride, sensuality, and self-interest. Love for God, by contrast, must be pure — seeking nothing in return and springing from the grace of God dwelling in the heart. Saint Ignatius warns that thinking of God in a worldly way is to offer an “impure sacrifice.”  God desires instead “only true, spiritual, holy love.” He seeks a union in which our desires and emotions are united with His will, His divine love—where every act of love become a living prayer: “Thy will be done,” not “My will be done.” In this love, we begin to want what God wants, to think as He thinks, and to live as He lives. It is a love that heals, purifies, and draws us into communion with Him.

The Apostle Paul reinforces this by declaring that love is greater than anything else—greater than knowledge, prophecies, even faith itself. He calls love the “bond of perfection” that unites us with God.

Saint Maximus the Confessor describes this love as a “holy state of the soul” that values the knowledge of God above all things. He explains that we cannot truly possess this love while we’re still attached to worldly desires. 

Elder Thaddeus teaches that God’s love is not “according to this world.” Rather, it is a mystical participation in His divine energies—a sacramental union that transforms us from within.

Saint Porphyrios uses the language of passion and desire, urging us to make Christ our deepest longing: “Christ is everything. He is our love. He is the object of our desire.” He exhorts us to be able to say, “My Christ, whatever Your love dictates, it is sufficient for me to live within Your love.” Truly, “the love of God transforms everything; it sanctifies, amends, and changes the nature of everything.”

What Jesus Commands

The love Jesus commands is a call to union with Him, a commitment to live by His teaching. Since He Himself is love, only through Him are we able to truly love. As we follow Him, He draws us into a love that is inseparable from obedience: 

“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments”

To love Christ means aligning our entire life with His will, not merely seeking to feel good or to get what we want. It is a willingness to let God reshape our hearts and desires so we may become more like Him. This love endures every trial and tribulation He permits. It requires surrender—laying aside self-centered desires in order to be conformed with His will.

Gift of the Holy Spirit

Saint Paul teaches that we can only experience this kind of love through the Holy Spirit—“God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit” — and love is the first fruit of the Spirit’s work in us. This love is not produced by our own effort; it is a gift God grants as we cooperate with Him, participating in His divine energies.

How We Cultivate This Love

There are no shortcuts. Unlike human affection, divine love cannot be manufactured by effort or discipline; it is a gift of grace, received through repentance and humility. In worldly love, our actions are essential—developing affection through spending quality time together, offering consistent care and support, being honest and vulnerable, communicating openly, and building trust through reliability and shared experiences. Such worldly love grows through small, everyday acts: listening attentively, showing appreciation, bringing gifts, and working through adversity together. Actions that we initiate to build a human relationship.

Saint Ignatius warns us that the love of God cannot be created in this way, through our own efforts. We may commit ourselves to meditation, spiritual reading, or other disciplines. We may think by placing our effort into daily prayer, ascetic practices like fasting, or even regular attendance at worship services we will love God. This approach is an error, he says. Not because these activities are bad, but they assume you can become united with God’s love through your own effort, just like you do in human relationships.

Love of God is not something we can generate by making it a goal. It is something that is given to us by Him. We cannot say, “I must develop my love of God” and expect to produce it by sheer willpower. Saint Ignatius insists that developing a love for God requires prior preparation of the soul, so that God Himself may bestow it. 

Saint Porphyrios teaches that to love God we must first prepare our hearts. We need to cultivate an “Orthodox spirit”: a heart shaped by faith, repentance, and a longing for Christ. Most importantly, this begins with purity of heart and humility. We must recognize God’s almighty power and the reality of the Final Judgment at His Second Coming. Without a heart free of selfish desire and pride, there is no room for His love in us. We must let go of pride, self‑interest, and sensuality. 

Our first step, then, is a life of repentance—turning away from sin so that divine grace can fill us. This must be our goal. Love of God emerges from a purified, humble heart and the gift of His grace, not from self-directed exercises or manufactured feelings. It must be something much greater than words such as “I believe,” or “I need your help,” or even “I love you.”

Fear of God and Growth of Awe

Saint Ignatius says, 

“Love for God is…available only for those who have completed the invisible path to God.” 

He teaches that this path begins with a reverent fear of God. Jesus Himself says, 

“Come you children, and harken unto me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord.” 

This fear is not terror but a deep awe and reverence that keeps us from becoming indifferent and instructs us in the way of God’s commandments. We must remember that He is our Creator and Judge, who will determine our fate at the Final Judgment when He comes again. Such fear is the acknowledgement of Who He is—a reverence that leads us along the path to a love greater than any earthly love. 

As this reverence matures, the fear rooted in any kind of punishment fades and is replaced by awe that burns in our heart, bringing warmth and light that fills us with joy as we are embraced by His love.

There are two kinds of fear: fear of punishment, and the fear of losing the joy of being in communion with God. As we grow spiritually, the first gives way to the second. Developing our love of God, then, begins with purification—ridding the heart of sinful tendencies so divine grace may fill it.

Fear of God is only the beginning. As our love deepens, awe becomes joy, and reverence blossoms into freedom. The commandments cease to feel like burdens and instead become the natural expression of a heart united with Christ.

Love of God is revealed in our obedience to Him. We must love Him in the way He has commanded us to love. Jesus says: 

”Abide in My love. If you keep my commandments , you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in Him.” 

The Journey of Love: Repentance to Theosis

The way is repentance. As Jesus said in His first public teaching, “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand”. Repentance means changing our way of life to be like His, to live by all His commandments. It requires both self-sacrifice and our cooperation with His grace. These sacrifices demonstrate our love for Him. 

At first, our efforts may be motivated by our fear of punishment at the Final Judgment. But as we walk the path of repentance and receive His grace step by step, that fear is transformed into a deeper one—the fear of losing the sweetness of His grace. As Saint Ignatius says: 

“Repentance is the ship. Fear is the helmsman. Love is the divine shore.”

In the end, the love for God is far richer and deeper than the feelings we often call love. It requires preparation, purification, humility, effort, reverent fear, and continual cooperation with God’s grace. It is not a self‑improvement technique or a method of emotional comfort, but a lifelong journey toward becoming fully alive in Christ—participating in His life, His love, and allowing that love to transform every aspect of who we are. This is the path of Theosis — becoming like Him.

References: 

The Refuge: Anchoring the Soul in God, St. Ignatius Brianchaninov

Four Hundred Texts on Love, Saint Maximus the Confessor

Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives, Elder Thaddeus

Wounded By Love, Saint Porphyrios

Matthew 22:37,  Col 3:14, John 14:15, Rom 5:5, Gal 5:22, Ps 33:12, John 15:10, Matt. 4:17