I was just thinking about - - - -
Valentine's Day is a time when special effort is made to send cards, give flowers or candy, or to go to a favorite restaurant with a special friend or "favorite" spouse. It's a nice day in the year when a singular focus emerges, namely, Love.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning penned the words to the very familiar: "How Do I Love Thee, Let Me Count The Ways..." We are not as formal or flowery in our contemporary world and so a simple, "I Love You!" is about as far as we go.
Some years ago, a popular song was written that contained the lyric, "What The World Needs Now, Is Love Sweet Love..." Sixty years ago a movie, The Kissing Bandit, contained the stirring lyric of, "Love is where you find it, Don't be blinded - All around you - Everywhere..." As a young boy, I was a bit enamored by Jane Powell and she was the actress who sang the song (I wonder if this is why I remember it so well?)...
However, the Contemporary Christian composition that contains an excellent Lyric on the subject of Love has been sung so superbly by Sandi Patti. It is entitled: Love In Any Language...
Love in any language Straight from the heart
Pulls us all together Never apart
And once we learn to speak it - All the world will hear
Love in any language Fluently spoken here.
We teach the young our differences - Yet look how we're the same
We love to laugh, to dream our dreams - We know the sting of pain.
And daddies all get misty-eyed – To give their daughter's hand.
We'll find too much in common - To pretend it isn't there.
There's no misinterpreting - The language of the heart.
And once we learn to speak it - All the world will hear
Love in any language Fluently spoken here.
The Scriptures indicate several areas where LOVE is to be exhibited by each of us: (1) we are to LOVE THE LORD with all of our heart, soul, strength, mind... (2) Husbands are to LOVE THEIR WIFE as Christ loved the Church... (2) we are to LOVE OUR NEIGHBOR as ourselves... and (4) We are to LOVE OUR ENEMY and do good to him... Interestingly, the word for LOVE is uniformly the same regardless of area, situation or person with which one is interacting. This is more than "Cupid's Arrow" aimed at your heart. It is a commitment in response to God's Love to each of us. It is the intent of I John 4:9-11...
In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation (complete satisfaction) for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
Let this LOVE be our source, motivation and practice...
Think about this with me - - - -
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