Ordering Our Loves and Understanding Our Limits

Our two boys were three and six years old when my wife contracted Guillain Barré. Fortunately, the doctors were able to stop its deadly progression caused by her immune system going crazy and demyelinating her nerves before it reached her vital organs. She spent the next year in bed on a roller coaster of “recovery” (she still lives with chronic pain and major physical limitations) while I tried to take care of her and the boys (with lots of help from neighbors close by and family who came from far away).

For a period, I kept teaching Sunday School and being a deacon. It was a foolish thing to do, and I would strongly advise anyone in that situation to order their loves appropriately, stop serving the church in these ways, and take care of their family. I became mentally, emotionally, and spiritually exhausted. Yet, I initially pressed on without getting rid of other responsibilities because I was used to being capable enough to fulfill all my commitments. I was not wise enough to know how to navigate the situation.

That experience is why the recent public spat about Vice President J.D. Vance’s claim that the Christian tradition teaches we must order our loves (ordo amoris) brought back bad memories. I asked myself: “How do the people reacting negatively to his claim not realize that unless you are God you always have to order your loves?” A person must order their loves. A university must order its loves. A country must order its loves. Every individual and every human institution must order their loves. Doing so is both scriptural and just a plain fact of reality.¹ To not realize as much is foolishness. Yet, I myself have been that fool at times. 

Identity, Proximity, and Agape Love

The reason why we have to order our loves is that agape love requires sacrifice. I John 3:16 is fairly clear in that it states: “This is how we know what love (agapēn) is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.” Jesus demonstrated that there is a cost to agape love. Reversing the Fall requires enduring suffering.

Jesus laid down his life for all humanity and all creation. Due to our humanity and limitations, we must lay down our lives in more particular, focused ways. That’s where Christ’s life is helpful as well as the apostles’ example. We clearly see Jesus, the disciples, and Paul ordering their priorities, their time, and yes, their loves in particular ways under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. They help only certain people and particular churches in particular cities. They make tough choices about who and how to order their loves.

Unfortunately, some misread even some of the most famous of Jesus’ parables to try and emphasize a universal approach to love that is only possible for God. For example, Tim Farron, a Member of Parliament in the United Kingdom claimed on X, “In the Good Samaritan, Jesus clearly tells us that our neighbor is *everyone* – including the ‘alien’ – and that you must love them, and that love is costly.” That is not the message of the Good Samaritan (although most of what he said can be supported by other Scripture).

In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus corrected misunderstandings about what it means to be an excellent neighbor. His key concluding question is, “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” (Luke 10:36). His point was that whether you are an excellent neighbor has nothing to do with your ethnicity, race, tribal or religious position, obedience to ceremonial Jewish law, etc. It has to do with whether you will notice and meet the obvious and pressing needs of those in proximity, even at a cost to you, as you move through life.

I saw the Sunday School class I was teaching do just that amid my wife’s “recovery.” They brought meals two to three times a week—for a whole year. People helped take care of our kids. They came and cleaned, washed clothes for us, and mowed the yard. They were good neighbors and good brothers and sisters in Christ. They saw a need nearby and sacrificed their own time and resources to meet it. They were Good Samaritans.

They could not do that for everyone in Waco at that time. Our Sunday School class did not have unlimited time, energy, reserves, etc. Thus, there will be some points at which we or our institutions must choose for whom we will sacrificially love. I missed some of my children’s school and sports events and meetings to take care of my wife. We must make these tough choices. Even before my wife’s health problems, our family had to come home from the mission field and leave what we thought had been our life’s call to take care of our oldest child with health problems. We must order our loves. And it is often not easy.

Today, my wife and I live very different lives due to her limitations. I never went back to teaching Sunday School and being a deacon. We also said and continue to say no to many other good ministry opportunities and endeavors. While our kids were growing up, I needed all my physical energy to take care of them, since I was the only one who could do significant physical activities with our two boys. I cut back on youth sports coaching to be more of an assistant than a head coach. We could not sacrificially help others as much as we would have liked. We have had to order our loves considering our new limitations.

Our Limits and Agape Love

We must also realize that a virtue, such as agape love, is not something you simply constantly do 24/7 to the point of exhausting yourself completely unless, as was Christ’s case, God calls you to empty yourself to the point of death in a particular moment. After all, the paragon of agape love, Jesus, demonstrated clear boundaries and limits for the years of his ministry until he was called by God to make the ultimate sacrifice. Virtues are something you practice at the right time in the right way. As University of Notre Dame professor Darcia Narvaez summarizes, “A virtuous person is like an expert who has highly cultivated skills – sets of procedural, declarative, and conditional knowledge – that are applied appropriately in the circumstance …Moral expertise is applying the right virtue in the right amount at the right time.”²

I do not always see scholars understand this point. In 2010, Thomas Jay Oord wrote a whole book defending a particular definition of love and agape love.³ He defined agape love as an “intentional sympathetic response to promote overall well-being when confronted by that which generates ill-being.”⁴ 

My concern with this definition is two-fold. It is not clear how this understanding is different from the biblical virtue of compassion. After all, this definition would apply to various biblical examples of Jesus showing compassion to the crowds (Mt. 9:36, 14:14; 15:32), the blind Met. 20:34), or his telling of the prodigal father’s compassion (Lk. 15:20).

Second, an “intentional sympathetic response to promote overall well-being” does not necessarily involve a cost to the giver, even in the face of “that which generates ill-being.” However, I John 3:16 is clear the essence of agape love entails sacrifice for others’ flourishing. Oddly, Ord wanted to avoid “equating agape with sacrifice.”⁵ A couple of Ord’s reasons basically boil down to the fact that agape love cannot be sustained. He argues, “First, self-sacrifice is untenable in ongoing love relationships…. Second, …sometimes we must not sacrifice ourselves so that in the long run we can provide more benefits to others.”⁶ I agree with the latter point but not the former.

Unfortunately, Ord fails to acknowledge that agape love, like many virtues, is not something one does at every moment of time (this understanding of virtue application has long been recognized as problematic in the field of character education⁷). A basketball player who can habitually dribble or shoot with the opposite hand without thinking about it does not perform that activity all the time. He or she knows when to apply this particular habit (and it is not all the time). In other words, Ord’s understanding of how wise use of habit functions in a life of virtue is distorted.

Like all virtues, agape love is a virtue that must be called upon in specific circumstances. In particular, agape love is necessary to reverse the fall in a similar way that forgiveness does. The person who habitually says, “I’m sorry” is likely Canadian but also not appropriately practicing a particular Christian virtue. We not only need to order our loves, but we need to understand when the appropriate time is to apply agape love amid ordering them. Beware of those who think we do not.

1. The two greatest commandments order love and church fathers such as Augustine also reinforced this point even among loving one’s neighbor: “Further, all men are to be loved equally. But since you cannot do good to all, you are to pay special regard to those who, by the accidents of time, or place, or circumstance, are brought into closer connection with you.” Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, chap. 28
2. Darcia Narvaez, “Human flourishing and moral development: Cognitive and neurobiological perspectives of virtue development,” in L. Nucci & D. Narvaez (Eds.), Handbook of moral and character education (pp. 310–327) (Routledge: 2008), 312. 
3. Thomas Jay Oord, Defining Love : A Philosophical, Scientific, and Theological Engagement (Brazos Press, 2010).
4. Oord, Defining Love, 43.
5. Oord, Defining Love , 41.
6. Oord, Defining Love , 41.
7. See Richard M. Lerner and Kristina Schmid Callina, “The Study of Character Development: Towards tests of a Relational Developmental Systems Model,” Human Development, 57, no. 6 (2015): 322–46, https://doi.org/10.1159/000368784.