Truth Month - July 2024
Day 3 - Love is not just feelings, but sacrifice and hard work. God is Love.
For many, today's marriage vows are something along the lines of, "I'll love you and be faithful to you (until it becomes too hard or my feelings change)." That's because our culture has lost sight of the true meaning of "Love" and romanticized it past the point of recognition. Shouldn't love be more about what I can give to others, than what I can get?
Love is hard! People are messy and sometimes are hard to love. Sometimes we even struggle to love ourselves. Strong emotions are often tangled up in what we call love, as well. At some level, most people highly value love and seek after it.
So the real question is, "What is love?" English is handicapped by having multiple definitions of the word "Love", which can mean many different things. I can love my siblings, or my parents, or my friends, or my romantic partners, or sexual satisfaction, or power, or people with whom I've forged relationships through shared hardships, or even God Himself.
The Bible defines sacrificial love (ἀγάπη or agápē) as:
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, 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. (1 Cor. 13)
Jesus said that the way that people will know that we truly are his disciples is if we show love toward each other. We are called to love God with all our heart, and soul, and mind, and strength. Instead of loving pleasure, money, pride, and self (2 Tim 3:1-6), maybe we should strive to show true love to others too. After all, Jesus did tell us to love our neighbors as ourselves!
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