Love is _____________!

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.

May 8, 2012

A couple weeks ago, I attended my grandson's baseball game.  My eldest granddaughter was there with her boyfriend and I spent some time visiting with them.  I've been thinking about that visit and love in general ever since.

I decided to do a little research about what God says about love.  I figured that would be the best place to go because the Bible hasn't changed even though our culture has.  The Bible is full of great verses and passages about the topic of love.  God's love for us is a perfect example and starting place to study love.  There are verses about love in relation to marriage, brotherly love (friendship), and loving  your neighbor.
  

Mother Teresa says:  "The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread."  From the moment we are born we look for the comfort of our mother's arms.  The search for love is inbred in us ... Without love we wither up and die emotionally and sometimes even physically.  I know I wanted someone to love me ... someone to make the pain disappear ... someone to fill the hole in my heart.  I gave love freely hoping...  What I didn't understand was this:  if I gave love and commitment, why wasn't I loved the same way in return?  That plagued me for many a year.  Until I came to know Christ personally, the hole in my heart grew bigger and bigger and I kept getting socked in the stomach.  As the song goes, I was "lookin' for love in all the wrong places."  I was hungry ... I was starving.  I took the crumbs of love thrown before me which made my hunger pangs even more prominent.  It must have been true ... I was flawed, I wasn't deserving of love and kindness...  My subconscious ruled and what my mind manifested became real.  When you're starving what are you willing to eat?  Anything...  Anything...  That's the sad part...

Yes, for many years, I was willing to give my heart away for the crumbs of love tossed before me.  I learned quite quickly that promises made in the heat of passion were just cunning ways of attracting prey (me).  I was naive ... innocent ... stupid...  I was bleeding, reeling from the long line of romances (in my case marriages) gone wrong.  Did I know what love really was?  No, I really didn't.

From a very young age, I learned that love was conditional.  I became a loner living in my own imaginary world.  I remember my father picking me up one night at the County Fair.  I don't know how old I was but my legs fell below his knees.  The ferris wheel was behind us and the carnival music blaring.  The sky was filled with stars and I looked up at them knowing that I would remember this night forever.  It was the only time I remember my father holding me.  I tucked my head down into his shoulder and felt safe.  His usual way of worrying about me and protecting me was to get angry with me and berate me.  Last time I was at my daughter's home in Florida, I was looking through my old high school annuals and one of my friends made a comment about his anger on a night in December 1963.  I struggled with abandonment issues and, looking back, I realize that I clung to relationships that should have ended before they began.

Today, our young people choose to live with one another at the drop of a hat.  Love is here today, gone tomorrow.  Love is getting what you want and if you don't get what you want, you move on.  Love is "self" serving.  Love is based on feelings, the media hype, movies, songs ... you name it.  There are starter wives and husbands followed by the real thing?  That may seem okay but what if you are the "starter" that is left behind?   GK Chesterton says:  "The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost."  True, true, true...  So often, we take love for granted thinking that it can be easily replaced.  I doubt it, we take ourselves (and our selfishness and ideals) with us as we move through life.

There's an old saying ... if you want to change the future, study the past.  Too tough, right?  We live in a microwave world of quick fixes.  There's a reason why we act the way we do and why we attract the people we do...  Until that is dealt with, history tends to repeat itself.  Let me tell you, it wasn't easy looking into my relationships and my childhood.  In fact, it was downright painful!  I was able to go back before I could communicate ... I know my original perpetrator was not my father but was a man who's face remains blurred.  I know that I was not protected and that my abuses were swept under the rug.  Who in the world wants to ruffle family feathers??  More common than you think...

Love is patient and kind.  It allows for grace and forgiveness ... score keeping becomes  passe.   It is not envious, nor boastful.  It does not insist on it's own way allowing compromise and open communication.  Real love wants to know when it offends and stings.  Love may change but it is constant knowing that feelings come and go.  Love is a decision and mature love thinks about what is right, honorable, and true.  There are many different kinds of love ... the love a parent has for a child, a friend has for a friend, a spouse has for their partner.  For me, what was the turning point was knowing that God came first in my life.  Until I got that right, my life stayed fragmented.  I am okay following His rules, His way...

What's God's way?  God gives us guidelines for what love is and isn't.  Check it out.  To settle for less than His ideal means trouble ahead.  God says that sex within the confines of marriage is blessed and should be embraced.  If you use sex to catch a mate, once you've caught him or her what role does it play?  Truth and light ... if you walk in truth and light, there are no secrets are there?  Love is transparency.

I have concerns for our nation and our families.  If you watch Modern Family, you know how much the structure of the family has changed.  What my grandparents, parents, and I knew as normal no longer exists.  I have had periods of time, when I've spent long days in bed recovering.  I realized how much television has corrupted our ways of thinking and doing.  What shows are we drawn to?  Yes, we laugh and say how silly it is but, in truth, our minds are being drawn to the new way ... today's way.  What's been the result?  We have children being exploited for money ... our children are confused thinking that sex is love ... casual sex is okay as long as it is consensual.  Fathers are presented in less than favorable roles.   Nothing is left to the imagination and our appetites are insatiable.  Where do we go from here?

As we think about love, we need to remember that God loves us just the way we are.  We also need to remember that He refuses to leave us that way.  He wants us to be just like Jesus.  On that note, I'm going to go out and check on the casita.  The hammering has stopped ... must be lunch time!!   Always remember, Readers, that I love you and am praying for you.  Yes, I said "love."  I care about each and every one of you and want life's best for you.  More than that, I want God's best for you ... NO MORE CRUMBS!!

Miss Dottie