What Makes Love Make Sense By Pst. Kitoto

Saying “I love you is never enough to convey true love.” In 1 Corinthians 13 the Bible shares three phrases at the introduction of this chapter that made me reflect on the issue of love in relationships. As much as love involves feelings that may be attached to some level of attraction to the person you claim to love, it only makes sense when we step beyond this claim to living responsibly with or before this person.

First: “speaking with tongues of men and angels”
For most people, love has remained as a mere expression of well organized words that lack a deliberate lifestyle to support the confession of love. Telling a woman or to the contrary, a woman telling a man “I love you” in itself is a statement of intent and not complete until such is followed by what love is or demands.

While in school we would say statements like ‘nakupenda kama peremende’ - meaning 'I love you like a something sweet.’ So, when a lady fell for such a trick from a man, one thing led to another, and soon it was time to raise a baby out of wedlock. However, such statements, had a much more psychological twist to them than could be seen with the natural eye. They had a selfish agenda behind them. In fact, where a two young people ended up with a baby, no matter whether they were in school or college, once the baby was born, she/he was delivered to the boys home. This is where we learnt that words we speak if not back by responsible behavior, led to unpleasant consequences.

Second: “Faith that could move mountains”
"If you watch prime-time TV or check the sales statistics on romance novels, you will have all the evidence you need that Western culture is obsessed with love” (Focus on the Family). There are moments our words can create enormous faith in others and even move them to an action that may not be interpreted as love motivated. We can make promises, make deals and stir up the relationship to suggest a move towards greatness.

Despite all the talk about love, the reality is that children go to bed every night feeling unloved by their parents, and while husbands and wives go to bed feeling unloved by their spouse. The trouble is that, our culture is largely becoming ignorant of the true nature of love and its effect on our relationships. Could our problem be associated with how we use and respond to the word ‘love’. For example, we may say, “I love eating rice”; “I love Bacon”; “I love my car”; “I love You”. What is the difference? What makes loving the car different from loving your spouse? At times we treat each other casually because of the way the word has been used.

Third: “though I give my body to be burnt”
Many times persons who have fallen in ‘love’ have said things like “But he/she was there for me when i was …”; Or you would hear, “She/he supported me with money to ….” Indeed, as much as the gesture may indicate a level of sacrifice, it ends up just as an ‘act’.

Jesus’ rebuke in Matthew 5:20 could relate here well - “For I say unto you that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees…” These people seemed to do all the right things like praying and giving alms and fasting just like we do. It seemed as though they were the ones who were exceedingly righteous and yet the righteousness that Christ demands far exceeds theirs. This is the measure that Paul brings to us when he talks about love in 1 Corinthians 13. In fact our Lord is requiring a righteousness that is beyond man’s capacity, a divine righteousness that comes from God, a standard that man himself is utterly unable to attain.

When you look at marriage from the Bible point of view, Man needs to love the way he love himself and also as christ loved the church. On the other hand, a wife submits as she submits to Christ and as the Church submits to Christ. This make the marriage an earthly relationship governed by biblical principles. Therefore, our measure of love must go beyond speech, empty actions of faith, and sacrifice that has no meaning.

So Paul goes further and tells us that, love only makes sense when it:
it suffers long
is kind
does not envy
does not parade itself
is not puffed up
does not behave rudely
does not seek its own
is not easily provoked
thinks no evil
does not rejoice in iniquity
rejoices in the truth
bears all things
believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
never fails

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