Must love be free, at conversion, to be really love?
But love comes from God (1 Jn. 4:7):
1 John 4:10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us…
And “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). Not because we chose to!
Yes, people are responsible to love, but God has to give this, too, there can be a tendency to look at the start of the process, at the new birth, as if it was the end of the process, in the marriage.
But the marriage comes later, and then at the end, love can be free, and freely given, yet in the start of the process, God gives life, and love, and then, more and more, we can give it to him, and with his freedom, give it more and more freely.