Love Does

Well, this is Valentine’s Day week, and I know that, that reality in itself, conjures up a wide range of emotions for many different people who find themselves at many different places in their relationships this time of year.

This year, I’m thinking about a discipleship cohort I was in about a year and a half ago. We talked about three things with regard to the great love chapter in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13.

We talked about how, in a relationship, you could get the “words” right and still miss it. We’ve all known, or been people, who are able to say the right things but have no action to back it up. We’ve heard the words, “I love you,” but with actions that tell a different story.

We also talked about, how you could get the “works” right and still miss it. You can bring home flowers and chocolate out of obligation but the recipient of those actions can sense intuitively that your heart is not in the action itself.

But a strange thing happens when three things align. When our words, and our works follow the way of Jesus -- when they are spoken, and given with humility and a true desire for the best for the person we are loving...now that is the kind of love that is an unstoppable force.

That is the thing fairytales are made of and to be honest we rarely see it.

We rarely love like that. And we are rarely loved like that. Most people, even the most sincere, often have unspoken or hidden agendas. As Bob Goff says in his book, Love Does, “We’re all amateurs when it comes to love.” As we continue to become what we were made to be hopefully we can admit that and align ourselves more fully with a love that is truly love.