Whenever you really fall in love, you want to completely give yourself away. You want to just let all your defenses down. You want to be completely vulnerable. On the other hand, we also see love is continually letting us down because people are letting us down.

When you love someone, you’re loving a human being. That human being to whom you’re giving complete trust will tend to let you down. There’s something cosmic about love. There’s something, on the other hand, completely fickle about love.

Do you have a philosophy of life, an understanding of the world, that can account for all the various aspects of love, explain them and enjoy them? There is one model of love I’m going to call the conservative ideal. There’s another model I’m going to call the liberal ideal. Both of them don’t work. Then there’s another model of love which, I think, is the Christian model that pulls it all together.

This talk was given by Rev. Timothy Keller at Redeemer Presbyterian Church on November 19, 1995 as part of the Redeemer Open Forum series. Open Forums were specifically designed for skeptics or those wrestling with the claims of Christianity.

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