Love is

 

I was watching a show the other day where one of the characters was asking what love is. Without knowing the answer, she was going into hives thinking about her wedding day. In the show, someone eventually reads to her Shakespeare's sonnet:

SONNET 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
   If this be error and upon me proved,
   I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

This seems to help her as she realizes that she must show up for her wedding day, hives and all, and hope that her husband-to-be loves her like Shakespeare says. But did you notice? He still doesn't say what love is. He just says what it is not.

Don't get me wrong, I love Shakespeare. And the spirit of the poem is as beautiful as the words. But I wonder why the show didn't quote the Bible? Because there is a definition of love. It's been written there for all to see for 2,000 years now.

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails." 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

So there we see. We now know what love is.

And it's nothing like we thought it was is it? The Bible also says that "God is love."

"Beloved, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God’s love was revealed among us: God sent His one and only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him..." 1 John 4:7-9

Do you know what I take away from this? Love is not anything like this world says that it is. When someone says, "I don't love you anymore," it simply means nothing. What they are really saying is "I don't feel wild and strong emotions about you anymore."

Love is sacrificial. It has nothing to do with selfish emotion. God himself is love and shows that love by sacrificing himself for us.

We love only when we take our eyes off of ourselves. And as Shakespeare said, if what he said about love isn't true...then no man ever loved.

So, I beg to say, do you love? Have you ever loved? In the true definition?

I think it is worth us all pondering. Including myself.

Hope Always

It has come to my attention recently that hope saves us.

Now, I'm not saying that salvation is through anything or anyone but Jesus Christ. But I've discovered that He is hope. There is little, nay zero, hope without Him. Without His death on the cross, we are without hope for salvation from our sins. Without the resurrection from the dead, there is no hope for life after death. Without His spirit and peace in our hearts, there is no hope for anything beyond the temporary. And how is that hope at all?

You see, hope saves us from ourselves. And this flesh. And painful world.

I've had an area of my life that I have been struggling with lately. And though I hate to admit it, I think that I, in a way, lost my hope. And I suffered for it. Until one night when I was praying and asking God to show me how to liberate myself from my struggle...and He showed me...hope.

The Bible says, "Not only that, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us..." Romans 5:3-5

I've always loved this verse and even wrote a poem about it (posted below), but I have never quite taken in the end of the list of sequenced attributes that suffering eventually produces--hope. You would think perseverance or character would be the end game. But nope--it's hope. Those things are wonderful attributes to have but it is hope that is what God is bringing about in our hearts through those things.

And that hope does not disappoint.

Ever.

Period.

Why? Because God loves us.

And so, when we are struggling with something that seems like it will never end, remember, God is hope. His hope saves us from our fears and from our suffering. It is the hope of our salvation that we cling to--that brings us joy even in this terrible world.

With God, all things are possible. And nothing is ever over, too late, or past redemption.

With Jesus, there is always hope.

~~~

"An Echo of Myself"

 

Occurring step by step, in sequences

A path both narrow and wide, yet constant

Through a glass darkly, a cloud surfaces

Inevitably, each voice grows distant

 

At first, the subtlety of the echo

Almost laughingly leaves the voice intact

Resonating unique, it rests as though

It's identity found what it once lacked

 

Silence, for a moment; a sword pierces

Once integral to me, now forgotten

The Word; as truth vanishes, one faces

A solitude from whence is begotten

 

Suffering--Perseverance--Character

Hope echoed from fragrant alabaster