Love

One mention of this word and many things may have popped into your head: pictures, names, examples, good and bad probably came up in an instant. Through all my travels I have realized that this one word seems to be always talked about.

I would get in a taxi or walk around in the open market and almost every song I heard had to do with this one word “love”. Turn on the radio and what is every one singing about? What is almost every movie about? What does everyone have in common around the world? They want to love and be loved.

I feel this is a deep longing, one that has been placed inside each and every one of us no matter what part of the world you are from. We long to be loved and to love another person. I can look at my own life and read old journals and see that this longing for love is a constant theme. When I was teaching I would talk to students all the time about love.

There is always a desire to love. There is always a desire to be loved in return.

But what do you mean when you say love? As a communication major I learned that language is arbitrary and therefore I want to be clear about what I think the word love means.

Do I believe love is a warm fuzzy feeling? Yes and no. I believe that when you are in love with someone those feelings are warm and fuzzy and you would do anything for that person. Nothing else in the world matters, not even the essentials like eating and drinking are a real necessity because you are in love and you forget about those things. But is that really all that love is? Oh thank goodness no!

I like to watch and talk to old people. They are very wise. They have gone through a heck of a lot more life then I have and so common sense tells me to listen to them. Every single one of them has told me time and time again that love is not just a feeling. When you are married you have to make the conscience effort to choose to love every day. Love is a choice. You are not always going to like the person you married. They will get on your nerves and things may upset you about them and those quirks you thought were cute when you were dating will become annoying when you get married. BUT you choose to love that person always, no matter what.

This is what makes me sad in the world today, when I see people choosing NOT to love and to just give up and leave. It’s also sad to see how movies and music have really corrupted and disfigured this beautiful thing called love. Hollywood has it all wrong.

The wise old people tell me it’s a choice. It’s laying down yourself and your rights for the other person. Love is about serving the other person. It’s not what you can get out of the relationship but what can you give? There is no room for selfishness in love.

Scripture is clear about this in the famous “love chapter” (1 Corinthians 13) I think this is one of the most beautiful descriptions of love. It says, “Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails…” then it ends the chapter by saying, “And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

These are things that do not come naturally to us. We have to work towards this goal in our marriages, in our friendships, in our families and even with strangers. For our whole lives we have to work at this and it’s not going to be easy. But I believe it is worth it.

God is love. Oh how beautiful He is. He is the great example that we should look to in order to see what real love looks like. What did He do? How did He love?

It is only with His help that we can truly love one another. It is only He who can teach us how to love in our relationships.