lovely

God = love. The two can’t be separated. They are the same thing. God IS love.

“This is how much God loved the world. That he gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refused to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.”

We (people) mess up love. There is no perfect love with another person. We seek out what we think love is. We compromise for it. We become selfish for it. We abuse it. We take it for granted. We hurt others. We ourselves get hurt for it. No wonder we make a mess of it at times – there is only one perfect love – His perfect love. God and love are the two most confusing and difficult things in our lives. But, in Jesus, the two are linked accurately, intricately, and indissolubly. “Our love for him always comes out of His love for us.”

Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut. Doesn’t have a swelled head. Doesn’t force itself on others. Isn’t always “me first.” Doesn’t fly off the handle. Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others. Doesn’t revel when others grovel. Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth. PUTS UP WITH ANYTHING. Trust God always. Always looks for the best. Never looks back. But keeps going to the end. These are all things God tells us what love is, telling us “this is what I am.”

He puts up with me, a lot. No matter what I say, what I do, where I go – I am bankrupt without love, without Him.