Bible Verses About Love

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also love one another.

Context: After Judas leaves the supper, Jesus tells the remaining disciples to love one another as he has loved them. Verse 35 says this love will identify them as his disciples.

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

Context: Jesus is speaking to his disciples before his arrest. He describes laying down one’s life for friends, then tells them again to love one another in verse 17.

And above all things be earnest in your love among yourselves, for love covers a multitude of sins.

Context: Peter follows this call to earnest love with hospitality without grumbling and using gifts to serve others. “Covers” should not be used to excuse harm or demand that wrongdoing be hidden.

Above all these things, walk in love, which is the bond of perfection.

Context: Paul addresses the church as one body. Love binds together the compassion, patience, and forgiveness of verses 12–13; this is not specifically a marriage instruction.

Let all that you do be done in love.

Context: Near the end of the letter, Paul pairs courage and standing firm in the faith with doing everything in love. This verse is in chapter 16, not chapter 13.

We know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and he who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.

Context: John’s statement “God is love” follows the confession that Jesus is the Son of God. The chapter connects trust in God’s love with loving one another.

Know therefore that Yahweh your God himself is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and loving kindness to a thousand generations with those who love him and keep his commandments,

Context: Moses addresses Israel after recalling the exodus and God’s oath to their ancestors. Verse 9 includes loving God and keeping his commands; verse 10 also warns of judgment.

Give thanks to Yahweh, for he is good, for his loving kindness endures forever.

Context: The refrain runs through a psalm about creation, Israel’s deliverance from Egypt, judgment on its enemies, and food for every creature.

“‘You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people; but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am Yahweh.

Context: This command forbids revenge and grudges. The surrounding laws also require honest dealings and fair judgment; verse 34 extends love to the foreigner living among Israel.

The second is like this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

Context: A scribe asks Jesus which commandment is greatest. Jesus names love of God first (verses 29–30), then love of neighbor. “These” refers to both commands.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat you and persecute you, that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

Context: Jesus contrasts the saying his hearers have heard with his command to love and pray for enemies. “Hate your enemy” is not part of Leviticus 19:18’s command to love your neighbor.

with all lowliness and humility, with patience, bearing with one another in love,

Context: This is part of Paul’s appeal to the whole church to live out its calling and preserve the unity of the Spirit (verses 1–3), not an instruction addressed only to spouses.

Walk in love, even as Christ also loved us and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.

Context: After urging kindness and forgiveness in 4:32, Paul calls believers to imitate God as beloved children. Christ’s giving of himself is the example for their conduct.

By this we know love, because he laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But whoever has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, then closes his heart of compassion against him, how does God’s love remain in him? My little children, let’s not love in word only, or with the tongue only, but in deed and truth.

Context: John moves from Christ laying down his life to a concrete question: will someone with resources help a fellow believer in need? Loving words alone are not enough.

In all things I gave you an example, that so laboring you ought to help the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”

Context: Speaking to the Ephesian elders at Miletus, Paul recalls working to support himself and his companions, then quotes Jesus about giving. This saying is preserved here in Acts, not in the four Gospels.

Ruth said, “Don’t urge me to leave you, and to return from following you, for 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 Yahweh do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.”

Context: The widowed Ruth says this to Naomi, her mother-in-law, before they travel to Bethlehem. It is a family commitment, not Ruth’s wedding vow to Boaz; the quotation includes her oath.

Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm; for love is strong as death. Jealousy is as cruel as Sheol. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a very flame of Yah.

Context: A woman addresses her beloved in a love poem. The seal, death, Sheol (the realm of the dead), and fire express love’s intensity. Verse 7 continues with waters that cannot quench it; these images do not justify controlling a partner.