By Shelley-Ann Brown
Love is one of the most difficult words to define in the English language – and for good reason! We use it all the time to mean different things and in different ways.
We fall into love, we fall out of love, we love baseball, or ice cream, but we also love our family, our country and our freedom. We say “love hurts” but we also say “it lifts us”.
We are “love sick” and we are “giddy with love”. We compare ourselves to “fools in love”, yet we know the wisest man to ever walk the face of the earth was, and is, the epitome of love.
So, what is it?
It’s referred to as an emotion, because it is something that we can feel, and it doesn’t quite fit in any other category. Yet, it differs from other emotions in that it describes more than just a state of being.
If I am sad, then the only requirement is that I feel sad. There is nothing to be said or done about my sadness. I can laugh sadly, or cry sadly, or sadly go to work.
Although love is felt, it much more describes a state of DOING, rather than a state of being! Love is thoroughly expressed through what is done because it inspires action!
Hearing 1 Corinthians 13 is one of my favourite parts of a wedding. As the bride and groom look starry eyed at one another while the music plays softly, putting everyone in a romantic mood, somebody steps up to the microphone and we hear the words: “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…”
Suddenly, we are taken from thinking about what (and how) love makes us feel, and reminded about what loves inspires us to do.
We’ve been called to love God and our neighbour; so what am I doing with that love I have for my neighbour? What am I doing with the love I have for God? Love, inspired the bride and the groom to make vows, to plan a wedding, to get married.
“What is my love doing?”
This February as we reflect on all things love, let’s not forget to put our love into action.
After all, our faith rests upon the fact that God Himself put his great love for us into action:
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” – John 3:16