We have all seen them. That elderly couple, tottering down the aisle way of the local market, holding hands like they were sixteen again. Maybe some of you even have that couple living in your family. A set of grandparents that appear seamless in their love for one another. You hardly ever know of an argument between them, they finish each other's sentences, anniversaries and birthdays don't go forgotten... And if you are like any other human being on this earth, you wonder how they do it.
Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' (Matthew 22:37-39 NIV) This is again one of those concepts that is simple, not easy.
I believe that love is a complex concept, not often understood by many in this lonely, fallen world. As complex as it can be, however, I know one thing to be true. Love is not meant to be looked as an emotion, love is a choice, a verb, if you will. This contradicts everything we want to believe about love. We want it to FEEL good, to be easy, to be the one thing we don't have to work at or think about to much. Oh, how wrong we are!
Love as an emotion is so shallow and fickle! If I were to look at my marriage in light of love as an emotion, I should have been divorced long ago. Marriage is hard work! It isn't easy, it isn't convenient and it certainly isn't stable. What it is, frankly, is a choice we make every day to keep on doing it. Love your husband when he isn't lovable, choose to not leave him when he is ill, or unruly, or thoughtless...That is love. A choice.
If you want to make it even clearer, have children. It is then that the love-choice becomes more understandable. Our kids can often be the hardest and the most rewarding things we could ever hope to do in our lives. They are definitely not always lovable, especially when teenage angst enters the picture. Remember when they were tiny and they woke up every couple of hours to demand food from your exhausted self? Loving them then was a choice. As they grew into the willful toddler, pushing every boundary you set up as if it were their life's work to make you crazy, loving them was a choice. Even as they roll their eyes at you and maybe even scream the most hateful of things during those teens, you don't stop loving them. They are your children, you choose to love them through whatever they are going through.
Love isn't easy. Ask Christ how easy it was to hang on the cross and He will tell you He didn't do it because it was easy, He did it because he loves you. I think we all remember, "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16 NIV)" Do you also remember that Christ wept in the garden before he went to that cross, asking God that if there was any other way, let that burden be lifted from His shoulders? His choice is our salvation. His choice is our example. His choice was and still is to love us. We were not worthy of that love, we did nothing to deserve that kind of unconditional sacrifice. He chose to love us anyway. That my friends, is what love really is.
The next time you have a fight with someone near and dear to you, the next time you are tempted to say something you cannot take back, remember, love is not an emotion that we can fall into and out of like rolling in and out of bed. Love, true love, is a choice we make every waking moment of every day. It isn't easy, but then the good things rarely are. Love doesn't mean there won't be pain. There are times that the deeper the love, the more painful it can be. Christ simply urges us to choose love, over and over and over. It is His first and second greatest commandment to us. It isn't a suggestion, it's the rule.
Who will you choose to love today, no matter how much they don't deserve it, no matter how hurt you are? Christ is our example and He will show us how. Choose love!
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