Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’ (Matthew 22:37-39, NKJV)
And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. (1Corinthians 13:13)
As you can probably tell from the verses, I’m not talking about romantic love. With that established, let’s talk about the kind of love it is talking about. You’ve read in many other posts how we describe agape love. This is the kind of love that stands the test of time because it is love that seeks out the best for someone else. According to Alyssa Roat, co-author of the book, Dear Hero, “it refers to a pure, willful, sacrificial love that intentionally desires another’s highest good.”
So, my question was, “How is your love life?” You may be scratching your head at this point, not sure what to say, or you may be declaring that it’s fine. Well, there is a way to determine how you measure up in that department.
Taking a look at 1 Corinthians 13, we can see that there are sixteen traits of love. After reading these, see how close you are to this standard. I believe I could confidently say that most of us will fall short. Here are the sixteen, according to the Christian Standard Bible verses 4-7)
Love:
- Is patient (it never gives up)
- Is kind (cares more for others than for self)
- Does not envy (doesn’t want what it doesn’t have)
- Is not boastful (doesn’t strut)
- Is not arrogant (doesn’t have a swelled head)
- Is not rude (doesn’t force itself on others)
- Is not self-seeking (isn’t always “Me first”)
- Is not irritable (doesn’t fly off the handle)
- Does not keep a record of wrongs (doesn’t keep score of the sin of others)
- Finds no joy in unrighteousness (doesn’t revel when others grovel)
- Rejoices in the truth (takes pleasure in the flowering of truth)
- Bears all things (puts up with anything)
- Believes all things (always looks for the best)
- Hopes all things (trusts God always)
- Endures all things
- Never ends (keeps going) [Parenthesis from the Message Bible]
Aren’t you glad you don’t have to live the kind of life God requires of us by yourself? I am. Looking at all these characteristics of love could easily make me feel defeated if I thought I had to muster up the strength to accomplish them on my own. I’ve heard this statement a lot over my many years of walking with God, “Lord, I don’t know what I’d do without you.” Indeed, we don’t know what we’d do without Him. The good news, though, is that we are not without Him and never will be.
When I assess my behavior towards others, especially my husband, I find that I fall short too many times of God’s ideal of love. And when I recognize the shortcoming, I always go back to 1 Corinthians 13 to remind myself how I am supposed to be loving them. I always have to ask myself things like, “Did I share that truth in a kind manner? Was I being too sensitive and, therefore, expressing my irritation? Was I being too impatient to listen to their whole side of the story?” You get the picture. God expects us to be imitators of Him, but, again, He doesn’t expect us to do it all on our own. So, how’s your love life? If you find that you’ve fallen short, no condemnation here. Simply do the work that needs to be done to bring correction to yourself. First Corinthians 11:31 tells us that “if we judge ourselves, we will not be judged”. We all have work to do, so let’s
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