What may seem to be love may not be love

I have acted in a manner that outwardly made me to look to be loving, when in my heart I was not. In my heart I have not been loving

 

Any and all action that is not motivated by genuine love, no matter how noble or how great a sacrifice is made is not love. 

 Of yourself you may struggle loving others. You first need to know you are genuinely loved. God would reveal Himself sufficiently to you that you would know, He has never, nor ever will act in a way that outwardly looks loving, but is not really loving. It is possible to know that God actually genuinely loves you. Of yourself you cannot, otherwise you already would.  I believe when you know God in your heart, you will be a lot more able to  know that  He actually loves you.

I Corinthians 13:1-13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a ringing gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have absolute faith so as to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and exult in the surrender of my body, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no account of wrongs. Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be restrained; where there is knowledge, it will be dismissed. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial passes away.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways. Now we see but a dim reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love; but the greatest of these is love.