Nothing in the world compares to love. Raise a child with genuine love and you give her the most important ingredient for a happy and successful life. Treat your spouse to unselfish love and you have built a foundation for a marriage that is full of joy. Teach people to love each other and a community of great strength emerges. Take away love and the world becomes a dark, grey place. Betray love and you will create a pain worse than that which comes from a terrible wound.
So what is this thing called love?
Our English language is not very specific about it. If we say we love ice cream, football, our wife, our son, or the Lord - the word means very different things, doesn't it? Love can be a sexual attraction, a wonderful surge of our God-given desire. Love can be an expression of the pleasure we feel when are doing something creative - as in, "I love to play the piano." Love can be a robust concern for people around us. A company of US Marines who are serving in combat conditions, who are ready to die for one another, probably wouldn't say that they are 'in love,' but their connection is undeniably a form of love!
Where does love come from?
Now, that is a mystery. Who can explain those emotions? I suppose psychologists could provide some logical reasons for what we call love. Physicians could explain the chemistry of our bodies and brains that are part of what we call love. But, ultimately love comes from our Creator. He made us to love and be loved. The Bible says that 'we love because He first loved us.' The Word also says that love is the primary evidence that the Spirit of God lives in us. "This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother." (1 John 3:10, NIV)
Love is a choice, a way of life we embrace when we are loved by God, in Christ Jesus.
Yes, of course, there is a love that is an emotion that seems to arrive from nowhere to surprise us. Infatuation leaves us breathless and can be more addictive than any drug on earth! But there is so much more to love than that. The Bible teaches us about it. This passage from the Scripture is familiar and you will be tempted to hurry through it today. Don't! Read it slowly, asking the Spirit of God to reveal the quality of love that He desires from you.
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11 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 put childish ways behind me. 12 Now we see but a poor 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. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. -- 1 Corinthians 13 (NIV)
Much more than eloquence, more than emotion, strong and lasting - that is real love, modeled on God's love for us.
Today, I pray that you will know the Love of Jesus Christ and that His love will transform you - from the inside out.
It's Valentine's Day. Celebrate love - for God's sake.
No comments:
Post a Comment