WHAT IS LOVE?

WHAT IS LOVE?

Recently I had a discussion with a friend about love and she made me re think it to some extent. I am already that person who believes that love is more about what you do than what you say and feel. Because love is challenged the most when the person you love is not acting very lovable.

So anyhow we were talking about relationships in general especially the ones that end up with a break up and how in the end as much as someone hurt you the person you hurt most is yourself. And also that you really beat yourself up because you feel like a fool and wonder how you didn’t see it.

As a person who has recently been hurt by someone very deeply that thought had run through my head enough times. Then my friend went on further and said that the scripture in 1 Corinthians 13 is about love not about loving others. Which basically also means myself. I was completely taken aback, I never thought that the scripture also meant that I love myself in that way. It makes perfect sense why we would struggle to give that kind of love to someone else because we haven’t given it to ourselves first. You can only give others what you have.

 I still have a lot to learn about love and it’s all very profound. Sometimes you go through something and you think you have it all figured out then another dimension just pops out. I love that this has been a year where God has shown me a whole new side of being a believer in him and who I am as a person. This journey has been emotionally stretching but I definitely learnt a lot about love this year more than any other time.

I learnt that those who love you will not always do or say what you want them to say but will act in your best interest at times. That was the biggest lesson and the biggest heart break as well. Sometimes people just figure that they can’t love you as you deserve and that is unfortunate because the source of love is God. It’s was never meant to come from you but from Him. God is Love [I John4:8]

Love is generally very complex because we have reduced it to a feeling. It isn’t what we feel it’s what we do. It is ranked above faith and hope and that tells you something about how great love is.. Considering that the Bible says it’s impossible to please God without faith, it really makes you wonder about love, as it is greater than faith doesn’t it? Could be cause it covers a multitude of sins J

I decided to take time and go through it with myself in mind where the words are applicable verses 4-7. Here is what I wrote and I hope as I continue to study this I will learn more and more about love as God intended.

Loving me

·         I need to be patient with myself

·         I need to be kind to myself

·         I need to be accepting of myself and not be too hard on myself or keep records of my mistakes

·         I need not keep punishing myself when I do wrong but forgive myself

·         I need to be truthful to myself

·         I need to never give up on myself and never lose faith in myself

·         I need to be always hopeful about myself and I need to endure through all life throws at me.

Loving others

·         I need to be patient with others

·         I need to be kind to others

·         I need not to be jealous or boastful or proud or rude towards others

·         I need not demand my own way on others

·         I need not be irritable towards others

·         I need not keep accounts of wrong doing of others

·         I need not rejoice over injustices but only truth

·         I need not to give up on others and not lose faith in others

·         I need to always be hopeful towards others and to endure through circumstances

That is definitely a deep commitment and definitely not a lesson one learns at ago and its easier said than done. No one is perfect and once in a while we will drop the ball on this.

My greatest comfort is that God loves me even more than this passage can describe and I can only aspire to love like He does. I am also grateful that at least I can count on Him to teach me.

Here is the full scripture passage below

Love Is the Greatest 1 Corinthians 13

1 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. ³ If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

⁴ Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud ⁵ or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. ⁶ It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. ⁷ Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

⁸ Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! ⁹ Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! ¹⁰ But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.

¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. ¹² Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.

¹³ Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.