Love doesn’t protect us.  That’s not its essence.   The essence of love is that it offers to guide us.  And if we accept the offer, it guides most of us into unfamiliar country.  It takes us to where there is very little shelter and survival is not guaranteed.  It points towards a precipitous path, and gives direction in a strange language.  It offers its own failure as the reason to try again.

Love is not a shield.  If this is the imagery, then love is laying the shield aside, and advancing towards an implacable enemy.

And God is love.