1 John 4:10-11
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
Love is more than a four-letter word. The concept of love has been so distorted and perverted in our modern world that we have difficulty understanding it. It seems that people seek to discover love that will make them tingle with delight and wrap them in a cloak of good feelings.
I must confess that I still feel that way about my wife of almost 61 years. When I first saw her I felt my heart melt and even at age 14, I felt that this was the girl the Lord had designed to be my best friend and sweetheart for as long as we both would live. It took four more years before we were joined in marriage, and we have felt His love through us in all of those years.
A vital part of love is sacrificing yourself for the one you love. As long as a person waits to be loved, there is no true understanding of what love is really all about. In Ephesians 5, Paul tells husbands to love their wives in the way Christ loved the church. That means loving enough to die for her. How many of you husbands die to yourselves in order to express your love for that wife of yours? Man, is it getting quiet in here or is it just my imagination? We all have work to do in order to come to a realization of the love Christ has for us. Then we are to pass it on.
Blessings dear hearts. Draw near to God today, trust Him completely and be a blessing!
—Pastor Cecil