I’m no
expert in relationships, but the ideas most people have about it are most of
the time very baffling, especially when it comes to the aspect of love. Now I’m
not taking a general stand or view of it, my perspective is from the Christian
view. Yes I mean Christian relationships!As a man, I want a God-fearing lady who is virtuous, intelligent (able to spark a conversation with on politics, ICT or general issues). The same may go for a Lady (add financial security to the list) who’s waiting for her prince charming to come.
Though some profess to be Christians, yet a lot of time their lives and relationships reflect a purely human ideology and understanding of love.
How can we say we understand love and leave God out of its definition? God is love, and He expressed it to us by sending His Son Jesus Christ to bear all our sins so that His perfection will be placed on our account through His sacrifice on the cross of Calvary.
Instead of accepting God's definition of love, we choose to accept and live by the world's definitions of love. According to the world, love is blind, love is pain, and love is wicked. These definitions are awfully misleading. As Christians, I urge us to stop tuning our frequency to these definitions. We get so confused when we mistake the world's definition of love for God's.
Recently, I read a friend's personal message (PM) on Blackberry Messenger (BBM), it read, now I'm paraphrasing, “the one who loves less in a relationship is the one who controls the relationship”.
Personally this is trash. It is not wisdom, and if it is, then it’s not of God. It is in all ramifications flawed and does not hold in high esteem the true meaning of love. This kind of love is conditional, selfish, blind, earthly, finite and finally non-existent.
When you love someone, how can you then want to hold out? You say "Hey I'm gonna love you this much, but not this much ok!” We do this because we afraid to be at loss in the relationship, or to be vulnerable, or even become heartbroken eventually.
I quickly want to point out that 'self-love' is different from 'selfish love' and besides, love is not selfish at all. So there’s no such thing as selfish love just plain selfish, the former is dependent on how you love others.
Why would you be in a relationship and want to hold back from giving your all, just because you are afraid of being heartbroken? And so you leave the other party to love on, while you fold your arms and watch without reciprocating (or give less).
Don’t get me wrong, I recognize the world is twisted, crazy and vile and will hurt you when you love truly- yes! But as Christians that is not an excuse to adopt the carnal ideology of love. My point here is your partner loves you; you love him/her back in the same or greater measure.
One thing I have come to understand is God’s love challenges you to be a better person and in turn challenges your partner to want to love you more. So I’m here telling myself I'm gonna love her more than she loves me, and she’s elsewhere telling herself (or someone) I’m gonna love him more than he loves me. When the two of you start thinking like that, what happens is that you connect on a deeper level. That's when beauty become ageless (like after 2/3 kids), age becomes timeless, imperfections become perfection, and in turn your love for God grows, surpassing the love for each other which in turn translates back to the love you show each other.
It is sad that the idea that we have of one partner loving the other more is based on our conscious effort to hold out on the love we have to offer because of the need to control the feedback mechanism or effect; that's simply manipulation. If we continue like this we will end up settling for less (through our carnal wisdom), whereas God has much more for us to experience and enjoy in our relationships (especially with the right person).
There are three variations of love I'd like to talk about; filial, Eros, and Agape. Agape begat the other two (filial and Eros), Without Agape, the other two would not have come to being, but man has in his own wisdom defined them as separate entities. Love is not man's invention (fact!).
It is God's intention for you to love your family because he loves you and everything about you (the church and the world at large), it is God's intention for you to be intimate with your partner, and it is Gods’ intention for you to never doubt His love for you even when you fall short or do wrong. Love is a verb (in grammar). It was out of Love God decided to save us from eternal damnation and condemnation. Regardless of what we do right or wrong, He will always love us.
As Christians our lives should reflect the Gospel we preach. Why hold on to something that we can freely give? You wonder why relationships feel like duty/obligation to self rather a thing to be enjoyed spontaneously as God intended it to be
Grace and
Peace be multiplied unto you!
I leave you
with the words of St Paul the apostle to the people in Corinth: 1Cor 13v1-end
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,[a] but have
not love, it profits me nothing.
4 Love suffers long and is kind;
love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5 does
not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6 does
not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; 7 bears all
things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.8 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. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part. 10 But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
13 And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Be Ye Transformed
This is quite fascinating.I must confess that,I just got separated from my girlfriend now an "ex"..though,she never gave me a reason to stay yet,I chose to stay and I gave her lots of reasons to stay yet,she gave up on me courtesy of our mutual friends who were like a wolve in sheeps' clothing during the entire period.I can remember when I asked her a question during one of our numerous conversations.the question went as thus "on a scale of 100,how much do you love me?"..her reply was "I would give myself an "A" though,not a strong one..say "78"...and she then asked me the same question too..and my reply was "there is not a single thing I should be loving about you anymore because I have already loved you through the entire scale of 100"..I am sure she was amazed because her reaction over the phone that night said it all but yet,still went ahead with the wrong decision for the 5th time,yes,the 5th time..
ReplyDelete