text: in matthew 5:44, is love here talking about an emotion?   great question.  my short answer is "no, not entirely."  love is never purely emotion.  love is a verb.  it's what we do.  love is also never completely without emotion.  if you look at the context of the verse, this is from the sermon on the mount and follows the beattitudes.    just before verse 44, jesus tells them to turn the other cheek.  i think this is one of those verses that people agonize over because they worry that they can't/don't feel like they should about enemies or bullies in their lives.  think about how jesus practially lived that out.  he was respectful of the jewish leadership even though he is the son of god.  they should have worshipped him.  they should have followed him.  but insofar as it was god's will, he submitted to their authority.  he tried to teach them and reason with them, even though they used those occaisions to try and entrap him.  he was loving to his enemies.  he was rough with them at times.  matthew 23:27-37 “woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! for you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. “woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, ‘if we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’ “therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. serpents, brood of vipers! how can you escape the condemnation of hell? therefore, indeed, i send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous abel to the blood of zechariah, son of berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. assuredly, i say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. “o jerusalem, jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! how often i wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  not pretty.  but they were blasphemous and deserved death, yet he taught them instead.  sought to reach them.  it wasn't warm and fuzzy, but it was loving.  he longed to gather them like a hen gathers her chicks.  but they were not willing.  in the end, for love to be fulfilled, it must be returned.  mutual.  our job is to behave in a loving way toward them, whether they deserve it or not.  i don't think that means trying to win their love or affection.  it's not trying to please or appease them.  but it is feeding them when they are hungry, clothing them when they are without.  comforting them when they are in anguish.  i think it's wrong to be kind to an enemy as a punishment.  some people get a litte too happy about "heaping coals of fire upon their heads."  i think what that refers to is if you are kind in response to unkindness, it should hurt the other person's conscience.  it should make them rethink their behavior.  it's not that you are kind to others to ensure their punishment.   in the end, god wants salvation for everyone.  if my kindness in the face of enmity can cause someone to draw closer to god, it's worth it to be kind.  my kindness is born out of the realization that their soul is valuable and endangered. not with me, but with god.  you love what you care for.  i believe we can love our enemies by helpful actions.  our minds control those actions.  it's a decision more than a feeling.  i believe that we can grow to have loving feel