Jared C. Wilson - Love Me Anyway: How Gods Perfect Love Fills Our Deepest Longing

There is nothing more puzzling, misunderstood, and abusedor more wonderful, powerful, and goodthan love. Love Me Anyway is a delightful, honest exploration of all the ways we human beings love, brushing away much of the clutter and confusion to explain what it really means to loveand be lovedwell.

Karen Swallow Prior, author of On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books

C. S. Lewis famously said that if we love anything (or anyone), our hearts will be wrung and possibly even broken. Far from being an easy-breezy, schmoopy, sentimental thing, love is a lifelong battle for those who dare to enter the arena. To love God and neighbor starts with denying ourselves, taking up crosses, and following the One whose own love ultimately cost him his life. Of course, the only alternatives to the costs, inconveniences, and risks of love are isolation and selfishness, which bring the greatest forms of misery. But those who lean into love will find over time that, though it will cost them much, it is also the pathway to great gain. Jared has done a wonderful job spelling this out for us in this wonderful volume.

Scott Sauls , senior pastor of Christ Presbyterian Church and author of several books, including Jesus Outside the Lines and A Gentle Answer

Anyone who can write an important book about something this profound while simultaneously making me hum songs from the Bee Gees and Foreigner, wellthat guy has my vote. Im not sure for what. Maybe for everything. Wilson is at his best here. Funny and insightful and kind about the enormously important (and confused) subject of love. The only downside is I had I Want to Know What Love Is going through my head the entire time. I think he planned that, though.

Brant Hansen , radio host and author of The Truth about Us

The best writers are faithful stewards of their scars. They craft healing words from wounded pasts. Jared has done just that in this richly textured exploration of lovereal love, divine love, the kind that unmakes and remakes us. No one can write a book so honest, so poignant, who has not traveled through the ruins of lost loves and misused loves and come out on the other side radically altered by an encounter with the shockingly gratuitous love of a God who lives to forgive. Jared has. His book is a gift to us all.

Chad Bird , scholar in residence at 1517

The Beatles and Elvis sang about it. Just about every movie and sitcom cannot have a happy ending without it. Love is at the epicenter of our culture and human identity, but every love song and rom-com falls short when it comes to identity-shaping love. That is the sort of love that can only be seen in God and his gospel. By taking aim at 1 Corinthians 13, Jared shows us the roots of Gods love for us through the Scriptures in this very insightful book. This love is the highest good of every human life, and, by the end of this book, you will know the beauty of being loved by God and being a lover of God.

Daniel Ritchie, evangelist, speaker, and author of My Affliction for His Glory

There are many songs, books, poems, and treatises on love, and Jared Wilson shows us the substance behind all the longings that fill them. This isnt just a book on how to love but how to be loved by the One who, knowing everything, loved us all the way through. Wilson has written a lot of books that I have enjoyed, but this one might be his best.

John Starke , pastor of preaching, Apostles Church in New York City, and author of The Possibility of Prayer

Most of us not only know what love is but think were pretty good at it. But there are depths and applications of love to be exploredboth what it means to be loved and how to love. This book is classic Jared Wilsonthoughtful, creative, biblical, and personal. Love Me Anyway will expand the horizons of your heart for what love is all about.

Mark Vroegop , lead pastor of College Park Church
and author of Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering
the Grace of Lament and Weep with Me: How Lament Opens a Door for Racial Reconciliation

I consider Jared Wilson to be my generations Yoda of gospel
centered writing. What drives Jared in this approach to ministry is his personal belief experience with the grace of God and his belief in the gospel of Jesus Christ. In Love Me Anyway , Jared explains how this grace impacts every single area of our lives, especially our relationships with others and the church. He draws from a well-known but often misunderstood passage of Scripture to call us to an approach to relationships that can only be understood by the grace of God in our own lives.

Dean Inserra , pastor of City Church in Tallahassee