Love. Everyone thinks they know what love is. Many describe it as a strong emotion, a romantic feeling, or a warm fuzzy sensation.
God’s definition of love is very different.
First, God says love is a verb – and action word – not a noun or adjective.
Second, God says love should be done unconditionally. No matter how another person treats us, we should demonstrate love to him or her.
1 Corinthians 13, often called “The Love Chapter,” gives us a details description of how to demonstrate love. I’ve included it below. Read it. Meditate on it. Pray over it, asking God to help you to put God’s love into action, demonstrating love to everyone, friend and enemy alike.
1 Corinthians 13: Demonstrate Love God’s Way
“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”