8. What Love Does
Bless you reader.
“Bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” 1 Cor. 13:7
I have a friend who is very level headed and kind. They confided in me recently that they have an issue with trusting new people. This person has been hurt and let down in many ways by supposed loved ones. It is entirely understandable that they would not be able to believe in newer un-‘tried and tested’ people. This person’s definition and perception of the reality of love, at least in their life, has changed. It is more cautious and fickle. And very likely to hurt them or let them down in some way eventually.
For this person love has changed. Over the years, my thoughts on love have changed. The question is changed from what to what?
The first time I fell in love it was because Lisa (that was her name) met all of my needs: she was beautiful, she was beautiful, and she was very beautiful. Since this is my blog I will tell my truth -I cared nothing for her other attributes. It took years to see what I really liked was her strength of character and simply the fact that she was attracted to me. Deep huh? It turns out she had a long list of attributes that are truly amazing. Back in the day I was only mildly interested in who she really was, but I ‘loved’ her. And, boy, was I ever sick when her ma moved her away to Kansas. I couldn’t even look at another girl for a whole month! This is where my idea of love added the need for a patient waiting and steadfast loyalty (praying she would feel the same loyalty to me , of course). My idea of what love does had been changed to a selfish childhood need of just getting my needs met to getting my needs met and now also protecting me from being hurt. I was now understandably a little afraid of ‘love’ and of getting ‘too close’. Love for me had changed. It now had an element of legitimate danger attached to it.
So did I get better or worse at love over the years? Well, in spite of my increased knowledge of God’s nature through study of His Word it does appear that I only really got more sophisticated in getting my own needs met. Let’s take a look.
Teacher’s have what is called ‘standards of learning’ to determine if any improvement has been made in a particular area. Improvement is marked by completion or satisfaction of clear objectives. Our ‘love’ objectives so far in this study are the attributes of love. Love is: patient, kind, it is not jealous etc. (remember these objectives are definitive and not “sometimes,” “mostly,” or based on circumstances). Let’s have a test:
Student (me). Have I always been:
Patient? no
Kind? no
Not jealous? no
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Never boasted? no
Never rude? no
Never selfish? no
Never easily provoked? no
Never kept record of wrong? no
Never enjoyed something evil? no
Always delighted in the truth? no
Did I: Bear all things? no
Believe all things? no
Hope all things? no
Endure all things? no
But, “Come on”, you say, “surely you have become a nicer person and grown to love people better over the years as a practicing christian?” Sure. I have learned to become more of a servant to the Lord than I was before. But that is far from where my focus is. My focus is on His perfection and on His Love. Do I want to be more patient, more kind to please Him and to be a better christian? I do, deeply. Do I want to be a better person for the sake of being a better person? No.
“One of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, ‘Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?’ And He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.'” Matthew 22:35-40
Love God first. Look what He has done for you and around you. Look at what you call love, what I have called love. Only then can we even begin to love another.
June 29th, 2010 at 10:20 pm
Suchhh an Honest Blog!! I Love it!!…God’s Love is So Crazzy Beautiful!!! I love the fact that absolutely nothing can compare….Once youv’e tasted of it theirs nothing worth trying that will everrr come close…it’s awesome how he’s made woman for man, man for woman and both male and female to fall deeply in Love with everything he is..over the years Iv’e learned one thing with temporal worldy Love..that we as humans are always replacable…he’s shown me that his Love is steadfast and other than Change his Love is the only constant we have in this life..I don’t know if this is true for everybody but the Lord has shown me over the years that to truly know the meaning of Love or know how to Love another human being we must first know deep passionate Love with our creator….Your Blogs are soo awesomeee and such an gr8tttt ending to a Beautiful Day!! Keep up the Awesome Work Brother..I ask he continue to Bless the Work of your hands, the desire of your heart and the hearts and minds he brings to read your blogsss..such a blessing….God Bless Tami
July 3rd, 2010 at 10:28 am
Isn’t that what holds all of us back from loving others? The fear of being rejected, hurt, abandoned, minimalized? The act of loving makes us as humans incredibly vunerable, and it is in our nature to be self-protective in such an open and honest state. None of us have ever been in a relationship where we weren’t hurt in some way, because as humans, we are all self-serving and incapable of loving others completely unselfishly. This is the beauty of God’s Love. It is all of the things that we as humans strive to obtain, but are incapable of fully realizing. In Him alone can we find true Love. It is only in loving God first, and then through continual acts of forgiveness that human love can endure.
July 18th, 2010 at 2:32 pm
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