One of the chapters in David Powlison’s book Seeing With New Eyes provides a critique of the best-selling book and materials by Gary Chapman called “The Five Love Languages.”

Chapman’s primary thesis, as described by Powlison, is that marital bliss is often hindered because individuals fail to understand their spouse’s “love language” and thus fail to convey their love to the other in a way that the other spouse needs/wants. Chapman’s main metaphor is that of empty “love tanks” that, when left unfilled, result in empty marriages and often destructive behavior.

Powlison acknowledges the key observation of Chapman’s book that people are, in fact, made differently; and that we need to learn to love others in a way that truly meets their needs (and not merely would meet our own if in their shoes). However, he takes great exception with Chapman’s primary message for motivating folks to learn “love languages.” He describes Chapman’s underlying motif as little more than a glorified version of “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.” Powlison explains:

Chapman’s full working philosophy might be summarized this way: “I’ll find out where you itch, and I’ll scratch your back, so you feel better. Along the way, I’ll let you know my itches in a non-demanding manner. You’ll feel good about me because your itches are being scratched, so eventually you’ll probably scratch my back, too.”

The primary criticism of Powlison’s critique is that Chapman all but ignores the problem of sin. As with most of secular psychology, it assumes all too rosy a view of human nature; and any “dysfunction” is but a result of an empty past, a poor childhood, or in this case, someone not speaking “my love language” and resulting in an “empty love tank” which acts out destructively.

I provide the above context so that I can share what I thought was a very well-put statement of the real problem related to “love languages” theory. Take a moment and reflect on the following paragraph from Powlison (p. 234):

A love language (or a lust language) instinctively looks at all reality through the lens of “my needs.” I’ve found that one acid test of my heart is how I handle being misunderstood, caricatured, dissed — not how I handle being accurately known and loved! It’s when someone doesn’t speak my “love language” that I find out what I’m made of, and by God’s grace being to change what I love for. Desires for good things easily become imperial demands that would enslave the very people who might try to speak my language — or yours. The lust that perverts such languages sets up an unholy law, by which to command and judge the performance of others in the eyes of an unholy king.

In the above paragraph, Powlison puts so well the main problem of The Five Love Languages: it conveys that the most important solution to relational satisfaction and happiness is learning to speak another’s love language. What’s wrong with that? It fails to deal with two realities: the sinfulness of man’s heart that causes him not to love when/how he ought; and the sinfulness of man’s heart that causes him to think that being loved is what will make him truly happy.

What struck me as I read Powlison’s critique of this material was that one could equally apply his critique not just to the “need” of “love languages” but any of our “needs.” When life is not going our way, whether in marital harmony, Christian service, employment, family life, health etc., do we rise up and become embittered or angry or frustrated and complaining? Do we explain such responses as caused by our circumstances? Is the loudest voice in our heads (and perhaps coming forth from our mouths) expressing “if only things were not so difficult, I would be better off…”? Would we be? Or, in fact, are those trials just revealing how poor we are and in need of grace, a la the Emperor’s New Clothes? Do we reckon that difficulties and “unmet needs” are merely stimuli which reveal our fallen and sin-stained hearts and which show our most desperate need for the medicine of the Word and the skilled surgery of the Spirit on our hearts and affections? Do we realize that when we fail to “count it all joy when we meet trials of various kinds” (James 1:2) that above all else it reveals our need for Christ to make us joy-counting type of people and not merely how bad our circumstances are?

Ultimately, Powlison’s insights are helpful to show that the best “self-help” in the world leaves us light years short of the real help for the real needs of our souls that God is most interested in. And any “Christian” counseling that fails to bring us to that conclusion is barely Christian, if at all. As Powlison says,

At the end of the day, a book such as 5LL makes some interesting observations. It can point out some details you might not have noticed. You ought to pay attention to the varied languages of human experience, your own included. It offers a few helpful tips that might help you love someone better. That’s good. But you’d better not buy the reasoning. … When the analysis of what is wrong does not lead directly to our need for the person and work of the Messiah, then that analysis is shallow. The solution necessarily becomes some version of “‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”

Meeting others’ real needs (suffering, trials, hurts) in this life and directing them to their deepest needs, which only Christ can meet, both lie within the calling of a disciple of Jesus Christ. O for grace never to pursue one of those ministries at the expense of the other, and for wisdom to know how to meet others’ temporal needs while directing them to the One who would meet their eternal needs.

As you might expect, I’d encourage you to pick up a copy of this book and read this chapter as well as the many other insightful articles contained therein.