Boys. Love. Nowadays, what
does that even mean? Do they truly hold high value like they once did? Did they
ever have that high of a value? It appears that in my time they are things to
be thrown around, discussed, brashly acted upon with no regard to how the man
or woman will feel later. Sex is casual, the word love is used to describe
affection for things versus people, and nights out with friends can easily turn
into who many people we can kiss before we go home. Is there any regard or
respect for the emotional implications of these actions? How it might affect us
in the future? Our future relationships? Our future spouse(s)? Our future
families and the values we teach our kids? How comfortable would you be telling
your future children that you loved more people than their daddy? Could they
trust that you will always love daddy? Or what about the time you got drunk
enough that you couldn’t remember all the men you kissed or hooked up with?
Yeah, it was a rager, but would you want your daughter to look up to you and say,
“I want to do that too one day!”? I highly doubt it.
So then
why do we do it? Are we truly that desperate that we can’t wait for marriage?
Or until we are in a long serious relationship? We are taught now that love is
something to be sung about and long after every day of our lives, to feel
lonely if we aren’t in a relationship or even around friends! In fact, humans were
made to love and give love. God created Adam to love, created Eve so they could
love each other and love the Earth. For the Earth was good and made in God’s
perfect image so to tend and care for the Earth was honoring and loving God.
They were vulnerable and naked, and felt no shame. They were free to love
without fear.
But this
is not how we have been perceiving love anymore. In fact, many are afraid to
love, afraid to reveal their feelings because of rejection. Shame has clothes
us. Love is (usually) not an instant connection like the texting or Facebook we
use; love is not smooth and clean but some of the best love endures messes and
hardships. Look at Abraham and Sarah! Can you imagine having a child when you
were 90 years old?! When your body might not work like it used to and have to
chase around a toddler?! Look at Elizabeth and Zachariah: your husband can’t
talk, can’t comfort, can’t communicate with his wife during her pregnancy
(which I have heard can be even more emotionally crazy than a period.) Look at
Mary and Joseph: Mary was to have a child, not to mention THE child of the
history of Earth, before they were even married. In that time, what a disgrace
that would be! Pregnant before marriage? These relationships were put to the
test and pushed the limits of love farther than these couples could have known.
Relationships
should have purpose and emotion behind it, not purely physical or lusting. Love
is not always shown by kissing or holding hands or allowing someone access to
our bodies. Don’t get me wrong, some people show their love mainly through
physical touch, I am included in this category. Yet, when we begin to compromise
God’s values, the values we strive for, we begin to lose touch with the
emotional connection we feel between those touches with friends/a significant
other. We shouldn’t be constantly looking for “the one” because no one can
truly fit whatever standards we set for the perfect man or woman. At some
point, they will let you down and you will be upset or angry with them.
Actually, the Bible even tells us what the perfect love is in 1 Corinthians.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not
proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, and it does not
anger easily. Love keeps no records of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil,
but rejoices in the truth. Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes,
always perseveres. Love never fails.” Answer this: does your past, current, or
future partner have all these traits? No. Will they ever? No. Only God
satisfies all these aspects of love and only Him. However, we should associate
ourselves with people who aspire to demonstrate these traits and it is
important to love in such a way that we reflect God’s love. Is it easy? No.
Will it ever be? No.
Being a
woman in today’s world, advertisements aim to destroy my self-image and my idea
of love. In order for a guy to longing look at me, I need to be this skinny,
wear Abercrombie distressed jeans (but not too distressed or else it looks
trashy and then he won’t like me,) have the perfect smoky eye makeup that it
looks sexy but natural, bed head hair that actually took hours to do, short
and/or tight tops, etc. I should only buy this color clothing to compliment my
skin tone, this color makeup to make my eyes and lips stand out, these types of
shoes to appear taller, etc. Basically, buy things to make me look like someone
I am not to attain a guy who wants something that I am not. To make it better,
I am taught by movies/music/pop culture that if I go partying, I will get free
drinks from guys because when I am drunk, I am more social and I dance more and
I lower my guard, so that makes me more desirable, right? I am not afraid to
“love” anymore when I am intoxicated. I am taught that love is nothing more
than a one night stand and a 50% divorce rate because love doesn’t actually
last and so what if I am impatient? I can find someone who will last in the
meantime while looking for someone, or something, better.
Except
this is not what God calls me, calls us to do. Outlined in 1 Corinthians, we
are first and foremost called to be patient, to allow God to work in our lives
and strategically bring in and weed out the people we need. Being patient is
not something we have been taught, hence why people rush into marriages only to
end with divorces, have premarital sex, lust after people they can’t have a
relationship with because simply put, we are impatient people. Yet when we pray
to God and rest in His love, we understand patience and gain opportunities to
be patient, thus learning how to exhibit that aspect of love to other (which
also in turn shows God’s love.) It ends with the unfailing aspect of love. All
in all, at the end of the day, God’s love never fails. It does not desert us in
our darkest times and it has existed from the beginning until the end of time.
When we are lonely, if we ask God to be with us, His love will not fail you, He
will hear your cries, and He will never abandon one of His precious children. Even
when we turn our backs on God and sin, He still loves us! It is near impossible
for humans to exert such a type of love! We become jealous or bitter or angry
in these cases and often we think, “Even if they came back, I wouldn’t want
anything to do with them.” Although we don’t always follow through with this
thought and may invite those who turned away from us back into our lives, God
never thinks this. He opens His arms wide and patiently waits for us to come
back. See how the aspects intermingle? If you work on a few of them, more than
likely you will also radiate others as well.
Perhaps I should have started with the context
of this section of the Bible as well as the verses surrounding it. Basically,
we are incapable of truly loving if we do not know the love of God. In Corinth,
people were abusing their spiritual gifts and showing off rather than using
them for love or God’s intention. Their, our, charitable acts and “good heart,”
do not grow us or benefit us, yet when we have God and are a mirror of His
love, the greatest love story in history, He grows us on the vine, He tends to
us, and helps us yield more than anything we could have before we knew of His
love. Loving is the greatest gift we can give! When we love, the world does not
become a place of one night stands and 50% divorce rates anymore.
So where
does this leave me in the love and boy situation? Sometimes I still feel
confused what a guy actually means when he sends me a text message, but I am
confident through God that when I focus on following Jesus, God will bring the
man who will love me with a striving love for Him first and me second.
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