This leads us to a serious and deeply meaningful question: When can our love truly be called perfect? That is the question this chapter seeks to answer.
Before doing so, a few necessary foundations must be laid.
First, perfection of love means the complete removal of selfishness. Perfect love is always pure love. We can imagine love that is pure in intention but still weak or incomplete in strength. But we cannot imagine love that is acceptable to God — love that is truly perfect in degree — if it contains even a trace of selfishness.
Second, perfect love must be understood as relative to capacity. Perfection does not mean the same thing for every being. What would count as perfect love in a human being — because it reaches the full extent of that person’s ability to love — would fall short if measured by the far greater capacity of an angel or another higher being.
With these ideas in mind, we can now take up the main question: When may our love to God rightly be called perfect? When can we reasonably believe that we are, in our own hearts, obeying the command to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength?
To answer that, we begin with a basic observation about love itself.
Love toward another person usually involves two elements. First, there is a sense of delight or pleasure in the person we love. Second, there is a genuine desire to do good for that person. When we speak of love toward God — who stands in a far higher relationship to us — we can express the same idea in slightly different terms. Love to God consists of, first, delight and satisfaction in God's character, and second, a sincere desire to promote God's glory.
The marks of perfect love that follow are built on this distinction.
FIRST: Entire Delight in God’s Character
This kind of love takes pleasure not only in God’s goodness and mercy, but also in God's power and justice. It holds no hidden doubts, no quiet dissatisfaction. Instead, it embraces God's character as wholly pure and wholly good, rejoicing in every way God makes himself known — whether through Scripture or through any other means.
Even the smallest lack of trust or contentment with God’s character introduces a flaw into love, weakening it and keeping it from being perfect.
This makes self-examination essential. If we find that God’s character, in all its variety, appears truly beautiful to us; if we are fully convinced that every expression of it is governed by truth, mercy, and righteousness; and if our natural response is wholehearted delight, then we have good reason to believe that we possess one necessary mark of perfect love.
It may not be the strongest or most decisive sign on its own — but it is an indispensable one.
SECOND: A Will Fully United with God’s Will
The second mark of perfect love to God is more decisive. It is the presence of such a deep desire to promote God’s glory that we are no longer aware of any wish or intention that conflicts with his will.
In other words, it becomes our settled and sincere desire, in all things, to do and to suffer exactly what God wills. Where there is a full and cheerful surrender of our own will — whether the path involves action or endurance — we find the clearest evidence that love is perfect.
Because of how the human mind works, this kind of harmony with God’s will cannot exist unless it grows out of prior approval of God's character. For that reason, this second mark is built upon the first. A will entirely merged with God’s will necessarily rests on delight in who God is.
In that sense, this one mark alone may be enough to answer the question of whether love is perfect.
To understand this more clearly, consider the difference between imperfect and perfect filial love. A child may sincerely love his father and yet still insist on having “a will of his own.” He may resist certain requests, hesitate, show irritation, or cling to personal desires that conflict with his father’s plans. Even when such a child obeys, it is often with reluctance rather than joy. His love is real — but not complete.
Now picture a different child: one whose happiness rises and falls with his father’s; who instinctively anticipates what his father wants; whose will so naturally aligns with the father’s that any disagreement between them causes genuine sorrow. We immediately recognize that this kind of love deserves to be called perfect.
This same idea lies behind the saying attributed to Francis Xavier:
“The perfection of the creature consists in willing nothing but the will of the Creator.”
What greater perfection of love could there be than the complete union of one heart with another?
This, then, stands as the clearest and strongest mark of perfected Christian love: our will becoming fully united with the will of God. It means setting aside the natural principle of life that focuses on self and self-will, and taking up the heavenly principle of life — love that finds its fulfillment entirely in God’s will.
This view is confirmed by Scripture itself. Jesus said plainly that he came not to do his own will, but the will of the Father who sent him. He described obedience to God’s will as his very nourishment and purpose. Scripture consistently presents nearness to Christ and true kinship with him as belonging to those who do the will of God.
THIRD: Freedom from Self‑Focused Reflection
When love is perfect and fully active, the mind forgets itself. The moment we begin turning inward to analyze our own enjoyment, to measure our feelings, or to worry whether God is giving us enough emotional return, we can be sure that love has not yet reached perfection. We may love deeply — but not completely.
Perfect love, by its very nature, directs all attention toward its object. It gives itself fully, without reservation or calculation. It is self‑sacrificing, and it would feel diminished if it paused to estimate its own reward.
It does have a reward, of course. Perfect love carries its reward within itself. But that reward arrives quietly, without being sought, and without pulling attention away from the one who is loved.
Additional Characteristics of Perfect Love
From these general principles, several further marks of perfected love naturally follow.
(1) A Deep Love for Scripture
For this reason, it is one of the subtle strategies of Satan to draw sincere believers away from Scripture under the pretense that inward spiritual guidance is more valuable than the written Word. Those who long for a close walk with God must guard carefully against this deception. God will not dishonor his own revealed Word, nor does the Holy Spirit work independently of it. To abandon Scripture is to risk losing that very guidance one seeks.
(2) Steadfastness Through Trials
Affliction may dim our joy, but it does not diminish love. Joy thrives in sunshine; love grows even in the storm. God may hide his face for a time, but a loving heart keeps looking toward him all the same.
Even in his deepest sorrow, Christ’s love did not fail. Though his soul was overwhelmed with grief, he still prayed, “Not my will, but yours.”
(3) A Strong Love for God’s People
Finally, those whose love for God is perfected will feel a strong and genuine love for the people of God.
Perfect love reflects the image of Christ in the soul, and wherever we recognize that image — in any Christian tradition and in any person — our hearts will respond with recognition and joy.
If this love for fellow believers is absent or weak, we can be confident that love has not yet reached perfection. God’s greatest work is forming this divine likeness in human hearts, and if our will is truly united with his, we will rejoice in that work as he does.
"Tis Love unites what sin divides;
The center, where all bliss resides;
To which the soul once brought,
Reclining on the first Great Cause,
From his abounding sweetness draws
Peace, passing human thought."
This is a revision of Part 1, Chapter 17 of Thomas C. Upham's book The Interior or Hidden Life (2nd edition 1844), written with the assistance of Microslop CoPilot. The original chapter can be found here: Some marks or characteristics of Perfection of Love.
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