On love!

Today is a day for celebrating love. Artificially selected by the makers of greetings cards it strikes terror in the heart of those dying to express love for someone. I well remember as a young lad the angst of buying and sending anonymously my first valentine card and then being surprised at not getting a response. Doh! I was so diffident then that she probably didn't even know I existed.

But let's think about love today. I can't help smiling to myself having written that. The definition of love itself is nigh impossible but we know it when we see it. One saint put it "to love is to will the good of another" and that is my preferred working definition. C S Lewis adds to that by pointing out that there are four types of love in his book The Four Loves.

Eros
Philia
Agape
Storge

Today's love celebration is all about eros love. Passionate love declared! Passionate love acted upon! Passionate love felt!

It's interesting that the Bible describes God's love vividly in all four ways. It's like God wants us to fully comprehend that he loves in stereo using four speakers instead of dreary old mono.

They say that when the Holy Spirit comes into our life he makes our hearts more tender for one another. We start to, more frequently, desire good for other people.

On the way to the station this morning I remembered that God is described sometimes as a jealous lover. He wants us to love him wholeheartedly in the school of love. We can then express our love more perfectly to others. He doesn't want us to love, or make, other Gods. He is jealous in that sense. He is jealously angry when we seek the face of another God.

He wants us to be bold and courageous in all our loving. He doesn't want us to be watered down and insipid. Or for us to dilute our love with lust. He wants us to be completely sincere too and not lead people on if we can't return their love.

Think on this

Let love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Proverbs 3:3 NIV

Dear Lord, I pray a blessing on this day. So that whether single, or in a relationship, our love is blessed. Amen

For reflection:
1 Corinthians 13
1 John 4. 7