What is love??

Well for starters, this isn’t one of those “I’m an embittered single girl who just would like the super-human, ultra-romantic man to sweep me off my feet” sort of notes. No no, this just comes out of a lot of recent conversations with a lot of different people about this whole love idea. So many people my age around me are trying to figure out this whole love thing. Recently I’ve seen those who are devastated in heartbreak, those who believe they’ve finally found “the one,” those for whom love is hardly even a thought, and those who are just feeling love will never come again. This is a rambling of thoughts that are jumbled together in my brain and I’d hope to make sense of them. Your responses are welcomed…

Love is such an abstract, but according to so many it is all that life is about. So what do we really know about love??

Love heals.
Love is patient, kind, humble, serving, peaceful, protecting, trusting, hopeful, and perseverant.
Love is fallen out of, and fallen into.
Love never fails.
Love brings us butterflies.
Love is something Meatloaf would do anything for, well, except for THAT.
Love takes chances.
Love is the movement.
Love is the cure.
Love is fun!
Love is painful.
Love makes people do crazy things.
Love fuels some of the best song lyrics.
Love is hard to find, and even harder to let go of.
Love is sacrificial.
Love is more than just friendship.
Love is the beauty of the soul.
Love in it’s perfection, casts out fear.
Love cannot be made, however, whoopie can.
Love requires faith.
Love is poetic.
Love grows.
Love is a decision and a choice.
Love is an idea, a thought, a moment, and cannot be captured completely…
Love is complicated.

How do we bind all these ideas together and make them a part of our lives? What does it mean for me to be a loving person? I believe there really is more than one realm to this love discussion, but much like a Venn diagram their worlds collide and have many things in common. I have love for my friends, love for others, love for my family, and possibly someday love for a significant other. But the bond that this love brings is very different for each of those relationships. For my friends, love means I would go out of my way to see that they are encouraged, supported, cared for, and find the best things in life. For others, it means that because of a calling on my life from God I will serve to the fullest no matter the position of humility it may cause me to be in. For my family, it means that I put them above others because they are connected to me and I respect that through obedience to them. For a significant other, love will probably start at attraction and warm fuzzies, but grows as the foundation to see through arguments and imperfections and bring the courage for a boldness to stand by someone in any situation life brings our way.

The idea I have struggled through is: what does love really look like when it completely not about me or my ambitions, when it is entirely about someone else and centered around God’s perfect plan for my life. I don’t know at this point in my life that I have seen or done love entirely without motive. Perhaps, it’s because not all motive is entirely wrong. Certainly, I know that the source of understanding love is God in His triune nature. The love relationship between a heavenly Father, Jesus Christ His Son, and a vibrant Holy Spirit is the kind of love we are called to live out. Not only for us to live out, but also we are invited to be a part of it! Even so, that He made us body, mind, and spirit so that we might understand by being triune ourselves.

These are easy things to write out, but even harder to live out. The thing about love is, we are still imperfect, and love is a perfect thing. So what happens when broken people attempt to live out perfect love? Failure, time and time again, it’s unavoidable. So we work hard at it, everyday, because love really is the key. I don’t believe for a second figuring it all out will be easy, but I still believe it’s a journey worth taking.

Thanks for coming along on a trail through my stream of consiousness…


Here are some quotes I’ve pondered on the idea…

“Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are.

Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two.”
- Captain Corelli's Mandolin6. "Love is the beauty of the soul."
--St. Augustine

"I love you, not only for what you are, But for what I am when I am with you."
--Roy Croft

"Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery

"Love is like a friendship caught on fire: In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable."
--Bruce Lee

"Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love."
--Erich Fromm

. "Since love grows within you, so beauty grows. For love is the beauty of the soul."
--St. Augustine

"....A simple I love you means more than money...."
--Frank Sinatra

"When you are in Love you can't fall asleep because reality is better than your dreams." --Dr. Seuss

“Meeting you was fate, becoming your friend was a choice but falling in love with you I had no control over.”
–-Unknown

“If you love someone you would be willing to give up everything for them, but if they loved you back they’d never ask you to.”
--Anonymous

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn, is just to love and be loved in return.” -- Nat King Cole

“Oh I don’t know why you’re not fair, I give you my love but you don’t care. So what is right, and what is wrong, gimme a sign. What is love?! Baby, don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me no more.”
--Haddaway

“What would you do if my heart was torn in two? More than words to show you feel that your love for me is real. What would you say if I took those words away? Then you couldn’t make things new just by saying I love you.” --Extreme

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy.
Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;
It is not self-seeking, nor easily angered.
It keeps no record of wrongdoing.
It does not delight in evil,
But rejoices in the truth.
It always protects, trusts, hopes, and preserves.
There is nothing love cannot face;
There is no limit to its faith, hope, and endurance.
In a word, there are three things that last forever:
Faith, hope, and love;
But the greatest of them all is love.
-- 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Life keeps going...

Week to week the time goes by so quickly. I feel like I've hardly begun a week and it's already ending. I'm keeping up with the 12Stone, receptionist, master's schedule pretty well I think. Learning more about life on my own and what that really means. There is a lot to do, but really few parameters on me. Which means that I can get through this time if I want to, or I can choose to make as much of it as possible.

Recently, I have had some pretty cool opportunities of connection in the community through our benevolence work (assitance to those who are financially burdened) and through the Co-Op in Lawrenceville. It seems like everywhere I go though people are asking..."Why are you doing this, you are so young, everyone who volunteers for this stuff is old??" "What, you moved 10 hours away for an internship at a church?" "You know there's not much money in ministry...right?" I think in the process of just taking steps forward that I know are what God has asked of me, I forget a little bit how absurd it does seem to everyone else. But it's not absurd to me because I know this is what I was created for. Every life experience I have had has led me to this point and many of those life experiences I have been able to use with people specifically in that situation. Even down to my personality type and the way I think fit with where I am today. And really, once I know what God has called me to do, it's really a matter of doing it. I know that for my life God has called me to be a part of compassion ministry in the church and that someday He will want me to have a position of influence, whatever that may look like for me. In that there is a lot of responsibility because He asks us in Colossians 3 to "live a life worthy of your calling." There is a high calling on my life and so every step of it must not be halfway done, but done well. It doesn't call me to take shortcuts and do "good enough." It calls me to go the extra mile, to push myself, and to take steps I cannot do without His help.

Almost daily, there are things I know I cannot do, but I have to walk forward an He gives me peace. I have no idea where the steps I am taking now will lead me. But I am thankful to be walking in Him and know that whatever it is will be better suited for me than whatever I would choose myself.