September 14

The word ‘love’ is bantered about quite readily. We hear people declare, “I just love pizza or barbecue or”—fill in the blank. We love the new DVD player or the new flat screen TV. We even use the word to be facetious—“Don’t you just love it when the new guy in the office gets it right?”

But what is the proper use of the over-used, often misused word ‘love’? Perhaps to establish its proper use we must define it in its absolute sense. The Bible tells us in I John 4:7 that “…love is of God.” If that is true we can hardly reduce the word to using it to declare our fondness for pizza!

Nor should we use it lightly in describing the romantic notions that may swirl like fallen Autumn leaves through our interactions with others. Love is too lofty to be the catch all expression that covers everything in our lives from fruit to nuts. And when we use it to express our feelings we must be cognizant of its lofty intent.
I Corinthians 13:5 establishes some guidelines that real love will follow.

“Godly love does not insist on its own rights or its own way, it is not self-seeking or resentful; it does not hold grudges and keeps no account of wrongs.” If you’re measuring what you feel or assessing what another declares to be his feelings for you, the only true measure of the depth of that emotion is God’s unchanging, unselfish love that gives His best to you as He expects you to give to others