For example, as newlyweds and young parents, Jana and I once had a conversation with a very devout and earnest couple from church. We were sharing about our spiritual lives and how we wanted God to strengthen our marriages. And at one point in this conversation the couple said, "We don't want our marriage to be good for ourselves, we want our marriage to be good to glorify God." Some spiritually heroic sentiment was being expressed here, but I also found the statement a little weird. Implicit in this couple's vision of marriage was an agonistic relationship between God's glory and our good, an assumption that you could have a marriage that glorified God but wasn't flourishing.
That's always been my worry with declamations about loving God "more" than others, the assumption that loving God and loving others can come into conflict. The stories here are numerous. Christians behaving hatefully because they love God "more" than their fellow human beings. Fundamentalist parents who control and manipulate their children. And that couple who wanted to glorify God with their marriage? They got bitterly divorced.
The problem I have with the "loving God more" framework is with the word "more." More implies less. For example, should a parent to say to their child "I love God more than you" all the child hears is "I love you less." And again, we can all share stories of how some distorted vision of "loving God more" has ruined families and hurt children, where some parental fever dream of holiness and righteousness came to terrorize a home. In my own extended family we have a story of a family member who got pulled into a fundamentalist, cultish Christian group and have witnessed the familial wreckage of "I love God more" zealotry.
All that said, from an Augustinian perspective I understand what is attempting to be said with "I love God more." Things of earth can become idols. Loves and desires can become malformed. Thus, all our loves, including our love for our spouses and children, need to be rightly ordered toward God. I understand all this, and agree in principle. But here's my reframe. I don't think the word "more" accomplishes what we are striving for here, because the love of God itself can become its own idol. Exhibit A: The Pharisees in the gospel accounts. Far too often, loving God more means loving people less. Worse, loving God more often leads to hurting people. Our families included.
Rather than "more" I think the word we want here is "better." I don't think God wants us to quantitatively rank our loves from "more" to "less." Rather, God is seeking a qualitative transformation of my loves. For example, the better I love God the better I love Jana. And I think this is what the "I love God more" people are trying, but often failing, to say. That when I love God more and more I love you better and better. Loving God doesn't encroach upon my loving you, it enhances and deepens my love for you.
All this is hard to put into words, so I'll share what this has looked like as a husband and a father. My love for Jana and my sons can be both selfish and lazy. But because of my love for God my love for my family has been transformed into something sacrificial, self-offering, and Christlike. The more I love God the better I love my family. God doesn't subtract from my loves but transforms them.
True, to experience this transformation I have to make God my priority. But our loving God must always keep in view this Christological aspect, how loving God "more" means loving you better.
So while I understand what is trying to be said with "I love God more" I think the clearer, safer, and more theologically sound way to say it is: "The more I love God the better I love you."
