Loving Others with Perfect Love

"If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no records of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, it always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears." (1 Corinthians 13:3-10)

Just as God loves us perfectly, we are now called to love others perfectly (or with completed love.)

When we love others in the way that God loved us, there will be no fear felt by them in our presence; just as we will know no fear in God's presence being so assured of His love for us.

But when I look around me, I see many lives still entwined with fear.

Husbands and wives who say they love God and each other, but live in fear of each other in some way or another.

Wives who fear what their husbands will do or say next, indicating that the love their husbands have for them has not been completed. They expect some form of hurt (usually in the form of criticism) to come from their husbands, rather than love that "always protects". If the marriage includes a "blended family", the tension is even greater, as the wife (born to be a nurturer) has to grow in "trust" that her new husband will "love" her children as she does.

Husbands fear things from their wives as well. They fear their wives will not regard the responsibility for the finances in the same manner that husbands do who have been called to be the bread-winners. Husbands wait in fearful expectation of the next completely unexpected outburst from wives who are often angry and over-emotional; for the wife has not perfected love for her husband either.

Being guided by emotions rather than by the Spirit of God is one of the biggest issues women have; often women arrive at this place of being out of control with emotions because they have not been given a "voice" by their spouses. Anger rises up swiftly when husbands diminish the concerns of the wife, don't allow them to voice their concerns, or don't give any consideration to their concerns.

Pride is the biggest one for men; many times pride grows more fierce in husbands whose wives refuse to trust them, not realizing that wives are showing their trust in God when they submit themselves to their husbands, whether husbands are right or wrong; just as Sarah did with Abraham, no matter what position Abraham's incorrect thinking got her into. His thinking was not often incorrect, but on the couple of occasions when it was wrong, Sarah still submitted to his decisions and choices, even when it could have harmed Sarah; for her trust was so much in God that she had no fear of Abraham. And God saved her every time.

What could have happened instead between Sarah and Abraham, is she could have put her foot down and said, "Absolutely not am I going to tell them that I am your sister! Don't you know how that could affect me? Aren't you concerned about me? You are so selfish, thinking only about your own skin! You could care less about me! I am so hurt!" But scripture doesn't record any response from Sarah, except quiet submission. Many times, women feel the need to fight some battle with men, when the battle belongs to the Lord, and all they are called to do is trust God that whatever happens, and to whomever it happens to (even when it happens to the children of a blended family), that God WILL take care of it all, and that nothing will be lost that cannot be restored by God.

Then there is the love between parents and children; which has it varying seasons as the child grows into adulthood, and the parents grows into old age, sometimes gracefully and sometimes not. The need for approval from the parent can be a life-long challenge to some children; for they had parents who were not perfected in love.

And when the child is an adult with a family of his own, patient love is often required in order to assist elderly parents who can be needy at times, and downright demanding at others.

Between believers, there is to be brotherly love or loving one another as though brothers one to another in a spiritual sense. Many times this brotherly love becomes agitated by differences in opinion about what scripture says. But it is most often "pride" that is at issue in these things, when brothers believe it is more important to be considered "right" than to be considered "submissive" one to another.

We all have relationships such as these; opportunities for our love to be "perfected." We can remove ourselves from such relationships and save ourselves a lot of hard work and avoid painful growing experiences. We can continue to find fault with everyone else in their lack of perfected love while never seeing that we are lacking in it ourselves.

OR we can continue to meditate upon scriptures such as those above and in the last few postings, memorizing them and guarding them in our hearts, praying for that day to arrive soon in which God will complete in us what He has begun; and that He will keep us humble and moldable in the meantime.

We will study the scripture above in detail over the next few postings; taking a long look at each of the attributes of the love we are to have for one another.