“Love
suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade
itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its
own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity,
but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But whether
there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they
will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away.”
(1
Corinthians 13:4-8)
I'm going to be talking about marriage
again today, it seems an appropriate topic given the soon to be
arriving holiday. February is often seen a s “love month” so why
not, right? I've learned some things to be sure but I have only been
married for about a year and a half, so don't take this as the words
of a master. That being said this is what I've seen and realized and
learned after a year of marriage and a number of years in this
relationship: love is magical, not magic.
What I mean is that while love is an
amazing thing that rocks the foundations of your world, its not what
the world at large thinks it is. Love is not a single glance and a
captured heart, it is not passion, it is not a need or desire or any
feeling at all, love is not something that is outside your control
(to an extent). We see it all the time, the story on the screen; two
young people have a chance encounter and love explodes and they spend
ninety to one hundred and twenty minutes stressing over it until they
have a passionate kiss in the rain until the credits roll. It makes
for a good popcorn selling flick but have you noticed that we never
stick with them? We don't see their relationship a few days or weeks
or years down the line. We don't see them realize that they have no
shared interests, or that the guy is obsessed with his career or that
she belittles things she doesn't personally like or understand. We
don't see real people with the real personal issues that make
relationships hard and love interesting.
Love isn't a spark and an explosion,
its a carefully built campfire. The wood and tinder and everything
else need to be placed and maintained properly if they're going to
burn for a long time. Long story short, love is a choice and a
willful act not something that just 'happens' to you. That feeling
you get when your heart is full and the world is a song? That's the
result of love not love itself and in mistaking one for the other
we've made a horrible mess. The love that is most true and stands
the test is the love that is chosen once and every day.
Men, this brings me to the real point
I'd like to make today. We all need to understand that it is both
easy and difficult to love our wives and girlfriends. We forget
sometimes that its a daily effort to maintain a relationship, that
its another full time job but one that is way more important than
that which puts food on the table. Your love for her is hard in that
your responsibility never lets up, never gives you a holiday, never
really changes, and will never be fully understood. It's easy in
that you don't have to move mountains to show her you care. Love is
more often than not, I've found, to be a skyscraper built of Lego
bricks; something great made out of a million small things. Write
her little notes, buy her candy or a card for no reason, do the dang
dishes without being asked! And above everything else, talk to each
other! Ask her what makes her feel loved and do it! Love and
marriage are exercises in self-sacrifice, you're supposed to be
uncomfortable sometimes; remember that your perspective should be to
make your spouse happy not vice-verse.
“Husbands,
love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave
Himself for her”
(Ephesians
5:25)
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