Encouragement

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What is love?

People describe love in different ways. The 21st century dictionary for instance, describes love as a strong affection, a strong liking and sexual attraction. The world now commends that it is all right to have sex with someone as long as both parties have a mutual feeling towards each other. It is obvious that the world has lost the real meaning of love. But as Christians, what does the word ‘love’ mean to us?

Our Lord Jesus showed us what true, selfless love is like by carrying our sins to the cross and dying in our place so we may have life. Only one name can be used synonymously with love which is Jesus. The perfect definition for love is found in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8; love is patient, kind, void of jealousy, pride, arrogance, selfish interest and irritation; love does not bear grudges, rejoices in truth; love never stops being patient, never stops believing, hoping, never gives up and never ends.

Isn’t it wonderful to know that there is someone LOVES you this much? As human as we are, we may fault in one or two of the features above. That is why the love of our Lord is all-perfect. As humans, our love for one another may grow cold after sometime but our Savior has assured us of the unconditional nature of his love. Thus as Christians, we should strive to perfect our love towards others as He has done with us.
The sure way to love someone as perfectly as one should is to first fall in love with God. But one thing we should know that one cannot know God enough to understand His love for us. It is a mystery so marvelous that a lifetime is not enough to discover and understand the dimensions of the love God has for us. When one begins to discover the sweet-filling, satisfying, pure, unfailing love of God, then he or she can show the same love to others. Loving others is not easy especially when they do not love you back but continue to hurt you. Whiles we were yet sinners, Christ died for us; whiles we continued to offend and hurt him, He still loved us that much to lay down His life for us.

What an amazing love that is! God did not give up on us so neither should we. People may despise you the more when you extend loving arms towards them but we should not give up on them. This could be because the last time they opened their hearts to someone, they got hurt really badly and so they have become very defensive towards people who show love to them. But as Christians, we should let the love of Christ which fills us so much to emanate from us to others who have their hearts hardened by hate to change them. We cannot love others by our own strength because we are bound to fail.

Love is a ministry on its own thus we need the constant strength from the Lord to serve well in this ministry. Love is patient so when someone refuses to open up to you, you must be patient enough for the person to warm up to you. Love is beyond physical attraction; it extends to form this unseen emotional bond between two people. Thus if someone tells you he loves you because of your body, then it is not true love because it only means he is attracted to the body you have but he does not love the real you. In this case, his love will vanish the very moment your body gets scarred or deformed in any way. Someone should love you for who you are and not for what you have just as Christ loves us.

You should be in love with Christ such that, anyone who wants to love you should first fall in love with the Lord to understand how to love you. As the light of the world, we should teach the world what true love is all about; something much deeper and filling than the physical attraction-connection people get when they meet. We should show the world that we can love others in selfless means rather than having sex. Fornication has become the most overlooked sin in the world as the world prescribes it be normal as long as two people are in love. We as Christians should set the pace to have sex-free, healthful relationships with others. We are in the end times where people are so deaf to the Word of God but when we start by showing love to them, their hearts would be softened enough to hear of the wondrous love of our Lord Jesus. Let us all love because love is of God.

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