Few struggles are more universal than the struggle to love well. We want to love ourselves but find ourselves caught between self-contempt and self-obsession. We want to love others but find ourselves exhausted by difficult people, wounded by betrayal, or simply indifferent to strangers. And somewhere in the background, we know that God has something to say about all of this–but His standard seems impossibly high.
Scripture commands us to love our neighbour as ourselves, to love one another as Christ loved us, even to love our enemies. These are not suggestions. They are not ideals for exceptional Christians. They are the expected fruit of knowing God. And yet, many believers carry deep wounds that make such love feel impossible.
Perhaps you struggle with self-hatred that you cannot seem to shake. Perhaps there is someone in your life–a parent, a former friend, an ex-spouse–whom you cannot imagine loving. Perhaps you are simply weary of pretending to feel warmth you do not feel. This article is written for you.
What we will discover is that biblical love is not primarily a feeling we manufacture but a flow that begins in God, moves through us, and reaches others. We do not generate this love; we receive it. And as we understand how profoundly we are loved by God, we find ourselves increasingly able to extend that same love to ourselves and to others–even the difficult ones.
The Foundation: Understanding How God Loves You
Before we can love well, we must first understand how we are loved. This is not merely a nice starting point; it is the non-negotiable foundation. The apostle John makes this explicit:
“We love, because He first loved us.” (1 John 4:19, NASB)
Notice the order. We love because He first loved us. Our capacity to love is not something we develop through willpower or self-improvement. It is a response to something that has already happened. God’s love is the cause; our love is the effect. If we try to reverse this order–if we try to love in order to earn God’s love or prove ourselves worthy–we will inevitably fail and grow bitter.
So what is this love that God has for us? John continues:
“We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” (1 John 4:16, NASB)
This passage reveals something remarkable. John does not merely say that God has love or that God shows love. He says that God is love. Love is not just something God does; it is who He is. This means that every interaction you have ever had with the true God has been an interaction with love itself. His discipline is love. His silence is love. His correction is love. His patience is love. There is no part of God that is not loving.
But perhaps the most stunning demonstration of this love is found in Romans:
“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, NASB)
The timing here is crucial. God did not wait until we cleaned ourselves up. He did not wait until we proved ourselves worthy. He did not wait until we demonstrated that we could love Him back. While we were yet sinners–while we were actively rebelling against Him, indifferent to Him, hostile toward Him–Christ died for us. This is not a love that responds to our value; it is a love that creates our value.
John elaborates on this in his first letter:
“By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John 4:9-10, NASB)
The word “propitiation” means that Christ’s death satisfied God’s just wrath against sin. Our sin was real. God’s anger against it was righteous. But rather than pour out that wrath on us, God poured it out on His Son. This is what love looks like. It is not sentiment or warm feelings. It is costly, sacrificial action taken on behalf of people who did not deserve it.
If you want to know whether God loves you, do not look at your circumstances. Do not look at your feelings. Do not look at whether life is going well. Look at the cross. That is God’s definitive, once-for-all, never-to-be-repeated statement about how He feels toward you.
Made in His Image: The Grounds for Proper Self-Regard
Once we have grasped how God loves us, we are positioned to think rightly about ourselves. Many Christians struggle deeply with self-image. Some battle self-hatred that borders on despair. Others swing to the opposite extreme, building their identity on accomplishments, appearance, or the approval of others. Neither extreme reflects biblical truth.
Scripture gives us a grounding for healthy self-regard that avoids both self-contempt and self-obsession. It begins in the very first chapter of the Bible:
“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (Genesis 1:27, NASB)
To be made in the image of God means that every human being–including you–carries an inherent dignity that cannot be earned or lost. Your worth does not depend on your productivity, your appearance, your intelligence, your usefulness to others, or their opinion of you. You have worth because of whose image you bear. To despise yourself is, in a sense, to despise the One whose image you carry.
The Psalmist meditates on this truth with wonder:
“For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well.” (Psalm 139:13-14, NASB)
David is not engaging in self-flattery here. He is stating an objective truth about God’s creative work. You were not mass-produced on an assembly line. God formed you. He wove you together in your mother’s womb. Every detail of your existence was intentional. The phrase “fearfully and wonderfully made” suggests that there is something awe-inspiring about how God made you–something that should make you pause and give thanks rather than dismiss yourself.
But perhaps you are thinking: “That was before the Fall. I am a sinner. How can I have worth when I am so deeply flawed?”
This is where the gospel becomes even more glorious. Yes, sin has marred the image of God in us. We are not what we were meant to be. But the cross reveals something staggering about your value: God thought you were worth dying for. He did not look at fallen humanity and conclude that we were worthless. He looked at us and sent His Son. The price He was willing to pay reveals the value He places on you.
For those who have trusted in Christ, there is an even deeper reality:
“Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1, NASB)
No condemnation. Not “less condemnation”. Not “condemnation that gradually decreases as you improve”. No condemnation. The verdict has already been rendered, and it is favourable. If God Himself does not condemn you, who are you to condemn yourself? Self-hatred in the believer is not humility; it is a refusal to accept what God has declared to be true.
What It Means to Love Yourself Biblically
When Jesus summarised the law, He said:
“The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:31, NASB)
Notice that Jesus assumes a healthy self-regard. “Love your neighbour as yourself” presupposes that you have a proper love for yourself that can serve as a measure for how you treat others. This is not narcissism. It is not self-worship. It is the recognition that you are a creature made in God’s image, redeemed by Christ’s blood, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit–and that such a creature deserves care.
Biblical self-love is not about prioritising yourself above others or excusing your sin. It is about treating yourself with the same grace, patience, and kindness that God extends to you. Consider how you speak to yourself when you fail. Is it the same way God speaks to you? Or is it harsher, more contemptuous, more unforgiving?
If God has forgiven you, you must forgive yourself. If God does not condemn you, you must not condemn yourself. To do otherwise is to exalt your standards above God’s. It is to say, in effect, that your judgment is more reliable than His.
This does not mean ignoring your sin or pretending you are better than you are. It means bringing your failures to the cross, receiving forgiveness, and moving forward in grace. It means caring for your body as a temple of the Holy Spirit. It means being honest about your needs and limitations. It means refusing to destroy yourself through neglect, overwork, or self-punishment.
You cannot give what you do not have. If you are running on empty–if you have never received God’s love or refuse to extend it to yourself–you will have nothing left to pour out for others.
Extending God’s Love to Others: The Command and the Power
Having received God’s love and learned to extend it to ourselves, we are now called to direct that same love outward. Jesus made this explicit:
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35, NASB)
Jesus calls this a “new” commandment, even though the command to love neighbour was ancient. What is new is the standard: “as I have loved you.” We are not simply to love others according to human standards of decency. We are to love them as Christ has loved us–sacrificially, unconditionally, persistently, at great cost to ourselves.
This is the distinctive mark of Christian community. Jesus does not say the world will recognise His disciples by their doctrine, their programs, their buildings, or their political influence. He says they will be recognised by their love for one another. When Christians love each other in ways that defy explanation–when they forgive the unforgivable, serve the ungrateful, bear with the difficult–the watching world takes notice.
The apostle John draws out the logic of this command:
“Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” (1 John 4:11, NASB)
The word “ought” carries the force of moral obligation, but notice the preceding clause: “if God so loved us.” The obligation flows from the gift. Because we have received such love, we are now debtors to love. We are not earning anything by loving others; we are simply passing on what has been freely given to us.
John makes this even more pointed:
“If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.” (1 John 4:20-21, NASB)
These are strong words. John does not allow us to compartmentalise. We cannot claim to love the invisible God while hating the visible people He has placed in our lives. Our love for others is the evidence–not the cause, but the evidence–that we truly know and love God.
The Hard Cases: Loving Difficult People and Enemies
Everything we have said so far becomes much harder when we consider the people in our lives who are genuinely difficult. What about the person who betrayed your trust? The family member who wounded you deeply? The colleague who undermines you at every turn? The ex-spouse who speaks ill of you to your children?
Jesus does not give us an escape clause for difficult people. In fact, He raises the bar even higher:
“But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matthew 5:44-45, NASB)
Love your enemies. Not tolerate them. Not avoid them. Not refrain from murdering them. Love them. Pray for them. Seek their good. This is not natural. It is supernatural. It requires the work of God’s Spirit in us.
But notice the reason Jesus gives: “so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.” When we love our enemies, we are acting like God. We are demonstrating family resemblance. We are showing the world what our Father is like. God sends rain on the righteous and unrighteous alike. He extends common grace even to those who hate Him. When we love our enemies, we are imaging forth the God who loved us while we were still His enemies.
This does not mean we must become doormats. Loving someone does not mean trusting them, especially if they have proven untrustworthy. It does not mean pretending they did not hurt you. It does not mean eliminating all boundaries. Love can be firm. Love can say “no.” Love can protect the vulnerable from the abusive. But love does not seek revenge. Love does not nurse bitterness. Love desires the genuine good of the other person–even when that person has caused us pain.
Practically, this often means praying for them–not prayers that God would judge them, but prayers that God would bless them, draw them to Himself, and accomplish His good purposes in their lives. You may need to start small. You may need to pray through gritted teeth. But something shifts in us when we begin to pray genuinely for the good of those who have wronged us.
Forgiveness: Releasing the Debt
At the heart of loving difficult people is the call to forgive. This is one of the most challenging aspects of the Christian life, and Scripture does not soften it:
“Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.” (Ephesians 4:32, NASB)
The standard for our forgiveness is God’s forgiveness of us. We forgive as we have been forgiven. But what does this actually mean in practice?
Forgiveness is not pretending that the offence was not serious. It does not mean saying “it’s okay” when it was not okay. If it were okay, there would be nothing to forgive. Forgiveness is necessary precisely because a real wrong occurred.
Forgiveness is not necessarily the same as reconciliation. Reconciliation requires two parties. Forgiveness is something you can do unilaterally. You can forgive someone who never apologises, who never changes, who is no longer living. Forgiveness releases the debt; reconciliation restores the relationship. Sometimes wisdom requires forgiving without fully reconciling–especially in cases of ongoing abuse or unrepentant harm.
Forgiveness is a decision, not primarily a feeling. It is choosing to release the other person from your inner court of judgment. It is refusing to keep a mental ledger of wrongs. It is entrusting justice to God and declining to take it into your own hands.
Paul describes what this looks like in the context of Christian community:
“So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity.” (Colossians 3:12-14, NASB)
Notice the phrase “bearing with one another”. This implies that living in community will inevitably involve irritations, disappointments, and offences. We are all works in progress. We will bump against each other’s rough edges. The call is not to find perfect people but to bear with imperfect people–and to keep forgiving, just as the Lord forgave us.
And above all, we are to “put on love”, which Paul calls “the perfect bond of unity”. Love is the thread that holds everything else together. Without it, all our virtues become disconnected and brittle. With it, even imperfect communities can thrive.
The Ongoing Journey: Love as Sanctification
Learning to love–ourselves and others–is not a one-time event but a lifelong process. There will be days when love comes easily and days when it feels impossible. There will be seasons of growth and seasons of setback. This is normal. This is sanctification.
The good news is that our capacity to love is not static. As we abide in Christ, as we meditate on His love for us, as we practice loving others even when it is costly, our hearts are gradually reshaped. We become more like Him. The love that once felt forced becomes increasingly natural–not because we have mastered it, but because His Spirit is at work within us.
The apostle John reminds us of the goal:
“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.” (1 John 4:7-8, NASB)
Love is the mark of those who know God. It is the evidence that we have been born again. It is the proof that the Spirit dwells within us. If our lives are consistently marked by hatred, bitterness, contempt, and indifference to others, we should examine whether we truly know the God who is love.
But let us not end on a note of examination. Let us end on a note of assurance. If you are in Christ, God’s love has been “poured out within your hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to you” (Romans 5:5). You have what you need. The love of God is not far off, waiting for you to reach it. It is already within you, planted there by the Spirit. Your task is not to generate love but to let it flow.
Conclusion: Loved, Loving, and Beloved
The call to love yourself and others as God loves you is not a burden to be borne but a grace to be received. It begins not with your effort but with God’s initiative. He loved you first. He demonstrated that love definitively at the cross. He continues to pour it out through His Spirit.
You are loved. Not because of anything you have done, but because of who He is. Let that sink deep into your bones. Let it reshape how you see yourself. Let it overflow into how you see others–even the difficult ones, even the enemies.
You do not have to manufacture this love. You only have to receive it and let it flow through you. The One who commands you to love is also the One who empowers you to love. He will finish what He started in you.
So rest in His love today. Extend grace to yourself. And then, little by little, day by day, let that same love shape how you treat every person you encounter. This is the Christian life. This is what it means to abide in love. This is how the world will know that you belong to Him.
All Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB) 1995 edition.