I was talking to someone yesterday and the conversation jumped over to love and hate. He said that hate was the most intense emotion, and I said that love was. This is why I believe love is more intense than hate.
It is easy to hate. Anyone can find any excuse to hate someone, and for hatred, all you have to do is point out flaws and things that you dislike. Hatred allows you to walk away from a situation when you have had enough. Hatred does not call you to be patient with someone who rubs you the wrong way, or be kind to someone who has no intention of being kind back to you. Hatred tells you to walk away when it doesn't go your way.
Love does the opposite. Love, true Agape love, God's love, calls us to be patient and kind, regardless of if the person rubs us the wrong way or wants to be kind back or not. Love, God's love, calls us to be humble, one of the hardest acts that any human being can ever do. God's love calls us to consider others before ourselves, and to sacrifice what we desire for the happiness and well being of others. This love tells us to forgive, and more importantly, forget! When someone does us wrong, we do not hold it over them or remind them. We truly forget it, just as God casts our sins into the sea of forgetfulness (Micah 7:19) This love does not delight in evil things, such as: abuse of others, social order that excludes others, or anything that is unlike God.
Hate can feel more intense, but there is one difference between love and hate. When someone hates you, and you hate back, you are thriving off of an emotion that already exists. God's love says that when someone hates you and is your enemy, draw out love and conquer hatred with love(Matthew 5:43-48). If two people hate each other, it is intense and can drag everyone who is around into the hatred; but the emotion fades, and the people will forget why they hated the other one. When the hate fades, nothing is left and people move on. When a couple love each other, truly love each other, they are on display for all to see and they inspire other couples; but when the love fades away, and the butterflies are gone, they still have love! They do not have the intense emotions, but they have the remains in their heart. They can look at each other and want the best for each other in every aspect of their lives, even when the butterflies are gone. That is why love is more intense. When the emotions fade, the love remains. Hatred is directly related to emotion, and when those emotions fade, so does the hatred.
Look at what happens when a hateful person comes against a true loving person. When the world hated Christ, the living embodiment of God's love, the world killed Him and crucified Him, but Jesus rose again and, instead of killing everyone who harmed Him, He gave forgiveness and love and won over thousands in a matter of days. Love is more powerful than hatred every time, no matter how deep the hatred.
Love is so powerful that it is the only emotion that can invite the God of the universe (John 14:21-24) Hatred cannot invite the omnipotent sovereign ruler of all creation, only love can do that. Hatred can invite other hateful creatures, but love can invite a congregation of loving people, a flock of hateful people, and the God who created all of these people. Love, in my opinion, is harder to do than hate; but is a much more intense emotion that hate can ever be. Hatred could not drive Christ to die on the cross for us. Only love could motivate Christ to die on the cross for us, forgive us of everything we have ever done, wash us clean of our sins, and take on the punishment that we rightfully deserved. Love is the only emotion intense enough to cause someone to forgive. Look at Christ on the cross. No other emotion could get Him there for our sins. That is how powerful true love is.
-D
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