A Lesson on Love: Pt 1

Hey, Lovelies! 

Today I wanted to start a series on love, in it I will dive into definitions, experiences, and my journey in showing true love in this time. This world has definitely gotten away from true love and it is filled with so much hate and ugliness. 

Jesus came to change it all, and it is up to each one of us to apply His teachings to our lives to bring His kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. 

In 26 years, I believed I had become an expert on relationships and love. 
Well, not technically an expert but I have been through my share of good, bad, and the in between. Recently at church our pastor has been teaching about human love vs. divine love. God's is love and He is the truth - so only God could show us what true divine love is. 

See there are a lot of differences between human love and divine love. Many of us have never been taught about divine love. We are only used to using human love - which was birthed in disobedience through Adam in the beginning. God had to send His love to the earth, Jesus, who was the truth to show us what true love is.

Before true love was sent we couldn't have known what true love was.
Sure we know the word love, but our version of love vs. God's is very different. We must be willing to turn in our human love for divine love.

Human Love:

It can be good and evil. It is sensitive, and dependent on emotion. Human love has its own opinions and ideas about things. It is unpredictable. It is selfish. It can be jealous, it can be angry, it gives up when its time to endure. It is bitter sweet. 

Human love is revengeful, its a "as long as you do me right" type of love, it's a "as long as I feel good today". There are many examples of human love in the bible - one example is Cain and Abel. Cain loved his brother Abel and murdered him through anger and jealousy. Today we see many stories of relationships gone awry. Every night when we turn on the news we hear of a death, war, destruction, jealousy, hatred, betrayal, all stemming from a concept of love. 

My college years were filled with a lot of dating, after being betrayed by someone who I thought I loved. My heart longed for revenge and my way of getting through it was not taking anyone seriously. In fact, I hoped that bad things would happen to all the men that had ever done wrong to me. Even in some friendships, I did not show true love - I talked about their faults, instead of just doing them right. With my family, I said I loved them but I only went to them when I needed something, I used them when it was convenient to me - I showed selfish love. 

To me Love, was an emotion. It was something that could be turned on or turned off. If someone crossed you, you turned it off and acted out of feelings. Even with strangers I did not show love, when I saw someone needed help I continued on my way - never looking back.   

Divine Love:

God's divine love is built on his principals and truth. It is unconditional, it does not waver. It is always true and does not fail.  Paul breaks it down in 1 Corinthians 13:

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. 2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.

He explains that love is above all, even for a believer of Jesus, if you don't have love you have nothing. This is because God is love, but not our concept of love He is truth and therefore our true example of divine love. 1 John 4:7-10 explains:

7 Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

You see, God is love and was true love first. He sent His only son that we might live, not because we loved Him but because He loved us first. 

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 teaches us how true love acts:

4 Love suffereth long, and is kind; Love envieth not; Love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, 5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; 6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. 8 Love never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.

Love is one of God's principals. It is His law. In fact God is love. And since God is love and truth, he is the only way you can have true love. Love can go through trying times and still be kind, it does not envy others or envy things, it doesn't show pride in itself. It doesn't snap off or go crazy when someone does you wrong or doesn't agree with you, it is not easily provoked, it does not even think of evil. It doesn't rejoice in other people falling or failing, but it rejoiceth in the truth, which is Jesus.

It bears all things, believes all things, hopeth all things, and endureth all things. It never fails. Jesus is our perfect example of what true love is and He never fails. Through Him and only Him can we have true love, because He is love. If you don't have Jesus you can't have true love.

I hope that was a good foundation for what true love is. I will continue to write on this topic and about my own experiences with human love, and how God is teaching me to show and have his true divine love. 

Hope you enjoyed and can use this to really think and apply it to your life!

Happy Wednesday!