Love Is…

Back in high school, I waitressed at a couple family owned restaurants.  These were small scale places with a regular clientele. I took orders and delivered food and bussed tables and at the end of my shift, I sat down to eat a meal of my own.  Usually someone had left a newspaper during the course of the day, and I enjoyed mindlessly perusing the comics. There was an old, one frame comic called “Love is” with a cute drawing and a sometimes poignant statement about the character of love.  I always saved that one for last – something to savor as I cleaned up and headed home.

This week is Valentine’s Day.  If love were nothing more than red and pink cards, stuffed animals, and foil covered boxes of candy, it would be so easy to get, so easy to give.  It would cost you practically nothing. Sweet thoughts and flattering words, romantic gestures and extravagant gifts are all wonderful, and have a place, but they’re counterfeit substitutes for true love.

Love is patient and kind.  Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude.  Love does not demand its own way. Love is not irritable, and it keeps no record of when it has been wronged.  It is never glad about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Somehow I don’t think this is what they’re selling at the store.

Everything Paul says love is are things we need in the face of weaknesses, shortcomings, and failures.  Maybe that’s why the King James’ Version translates the word love as charity.  Love is a gift to a person who is desperately needy, hopelessly undeserving, who lacks good and pleasant qualities.  Love responds to shortcomings. Love meets weakness.

Actually, if love’s very first quality is patience, that’s a pretty good sign that things aren’t always going to be rosy.  Love is long suffering. It puts up with much. It forbears – it carries the beloved forward past the point of conflict. It takes the long view.

Love is unexpected, unearned, undeserved.

Love is willing to play second fiddle.  It’s willing to be inconvenienced. And love is willing to yield.  Love says, I will go out of my way for you. I will give up having things my way for you.

There is no lack in love.

Love keeps no records.  There’s no scorecard or balance sheet, no points awarded or taken away.  Because love is a gift. It cannot be bought or earned. It cannot be stolen or forced.

Love is brave.  It holds on and keeps going.  It says no to fear and yes to courage, to possibility, to hope.  It’s fierce in its defense and passionate in its commitment to the beloved’s best interests and well-being.

Love by its very nature is impractical.  It’s extravagant. It’s improbable and absurd.  And it is so incredibly powerful. We will do just about anything to get it, or something like it.  What a difference it would make if we knew with certainty, no room for doubt or second-guessing, that we are fully and completely and irrevocably loved.  It’s a love that will not fade or mellow with age. It’s a love that comes through every time.

Maybe others haven’t loved you as they ought.  There are holes in your heart that feel like bottomless chasms and the brokenness seems beyond repair.  Maybe you have feasted on counterfeit loves and wonder if you’re too damaged for true love. God is never the one who says you are not loved, that you are unlovable, or that there’s no hope. No, His constant message is you are loved.  You are loved. You are loved. This is no saccharine candy store valentine. This is love that is stronger than death. This is love that reaches into the depths of hell and tenderly carries you to a wedding in paradise.

God loves you in a way that says I cannot, I will not, I do not want to let you go.