Choosing to Love or to Hate
Commonplace –
“Hate stirreth up strifes: but love covereth all sins” (Proverbs 10:12).
“Hate is a strong word” is a phrase I often use with my children, when they toss the word around lightly towards one another or things they don’t like or things they don’t like doing. As Solomon says, hate stirs up strife, and that stirring up begins within our own soul. Love is also a strong word that tends to get overused. However, we think it is okay to use it, because love is good. Yet, because it is also a strong word, we should use it lightly. In both cases, it’s important to pause and reflect on why we are having such a strong feeling.
When we say we love something or hate something, it’s important to examine our heart and ask if that is really the correct word to use for the situation. What is causing such a strong feeling within us? Are we feeling hate because of something evil? Then, it is appropriate and should move us to action. Or do we feel hate because of something annoying or inconvenient? Then, hate is not appropriate, because it is rooted in pride. We can and should ask the same question if we are feeling love, which might seem incorrect, because the proverb is telling us that love covers all sins. Isn’t love always good? Well, are we feeling love because of something good? Or do we feel love because something is affirming our ego, which is rooted in our pride?
In Proverbs 10:12, Solomon is connecting love and hate with the covering of sins, indicating this is about those times when we have been wronged. When someone sins against us, we have a choice on how we will react. Matthew Henry notes the following about hate, which sounds a lot like our current culture of constantly being offended.
“Here is,
- The great mischief maker, and that is malice. Even when there is no manifest occasion of strife, yet hatred seeks occasion and so stirs it up and does the devil’s work” (692).
In contrast, Henry notes the following in regard to love:
“The great peace-maker, and that is love, which covers all sins, that is, the offences among relations which occasion discord. Love, instead of proclaiming and aggravating the offence, conceals and extenuates it as afar as it is capable of being concealed and extenuated” (692).
We have a choice in how we feel and react. When some situation is evoking such a strong reaction, it’s important to know why.
Works Cited
Henry, Matthew. “Proverbs 10:12.” Matthew Henry’s Commentary On the Whole Bible: New Modern Edition. Volume 3 and Volume 6, Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., March 1996.
Holy Bible: Giant Print with Study Aids. Dugan Publishers, Inc., 1984.
© 2025 Angela Hormberg
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