Clay Walker says: “Love is the rhythm of two hearts beating, pounding out a message steady and true.”Mary Ellen Edmunds says: “Love is a verb.”
"Perfect love, casteth out all fear." 1 John4:18
"Charity is the pure love of Christ and it endureth forever." Moroni 7:47
"They do not love, that do not show their love." -William Shakespeare
“To acquire love…fill yourself up with it until you become a magnet.” Charles Haanel (1866-1949)
“We could love more if we sinned less, because sinning drains our batteries. Things like hate, jealousy, contention, and anger use up a lot of energy. The sweeter our relationships with God, the more we will long to serve and love Him and to make ourselves ready for anything He needs us to do. Maybe if we did some repenting, some returning to the Source of love, we would be able to discern promptings faster and better.” --Mary Ellen Edmunds “Love is a Verb” pg 8)
Recently I have been studying love. What is love really? There are so many different aspects of love. Romantic love, parent love, children love, human love, sports love etc...I think I side with Mary Ellen Edmunds when she says that "Love is a verb." It is something we do, not just something we say and talk a lot about. It's interesting, because people like to be "in love" but what does that mean?
I think it means giving and caring more about someone or something else than you do for yourself. I have learned over my 27 years that it's hard to truly love others and give of yourself freely, but when I think of true love, this image of my brother in law caring for my sister when she had to go into an emergency C-Section and the love that was in his eyes for her, that he wouldn't let anything happen to her, yet the fear that there might not be anything he could do to help it, I know at that moment, if he could have he would have done anything for her and he knew with all that he was that she was the most important thing in his world. I am glad I was able to see that.
And then there's the love I feel for my students, even though they do the rudest, most obnoxious things that hurt me to the core, I found myself asking today, "Why do I do what I do? It's painful some times." And then I remembered why as I was contemplating switching professions after a kid thought it was a good idea to spit in my water bottle. It broke my heart that the trust I had with all of my students 100% had been broken and I thought of Heavenly Father and how he loves us so much no matter what we do and sometimes we in essence spit in his water bottle and laugh about it and just don't care, but He still continues to love us because he sees the bigger picture. I guess that's what love is. Letting go of the petty stuff and clinging on for dear life to the things that matter most. I hope someday to be able to love that deeply and perfectly. But as for now I'm just working on loving myself enough to give others the love I can as an instrument in the Lord's hands. And I'm grateful He allows me to work like that. It's actually really fun! And I get to laugh a lot doing it, like last night on the swing set at the homeless dinner. A lot of love and new relationships being made. That's really why we're all here, to love each other and help each other home, no matter how weird or unique we all are!
