Category: Love

Letters whose topic focuses on Love

Posted on

Oh, How He Loves Us!!

My dearest sister,

If you have listened to any Christian contemporary music you have probably heard the song, ‘How He Loves’ by David Crowder Band. This topic reminds me of a video I once watched pairing this song with clips of John Piper and Matt Chandler’s preaching on the cross of Christ and of His great love for us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUUmhnOPBdE

Today we are constantly assaulted with false representations of what love is. The world entreats us to believe that love is sex; love is getting what you want from another person; love is satisfaction now; love is whatever you want it to be and can be suited to your own purposes no matter what.

As Christians we often reject these evil notions with our mouths but what are our hearts doing? Do they too reject the fallacies that this evil and dark world relentlessly tries to seduce us with? Or are we in our heart of hearts, dear sister, believing in the lies of the devil, allowing him to wreak havoc in our lives? If so, what foolishness! How can we expect to find a pure love in a corrupt and fallen world? Though we know with our minds that this cannot be, our hearts are still easily drawn astray by it. Instead of looking to the world, we must look to the cross of Christ. In the cross is a beautiful and mighty picture of God’s love for you and God’s love for me. He loves you so much and He is so jealous for you that He sent His Son to die for you so that you could belong to Him. Even while you were still a sinner, still Christ’s enemy, He died for you (Romans 5:8). In the video, John Piper exclaims, “That’s love, folks! That is mega, off the charts love!”

Do you know how great God’s love is for you, dear sister? Maybe you once knew it but have forgotten it. Look again to the cross, dear sister. Behold the ‘wonders of His love’ as the popular Christmas carol ‘Joy to the World’ proclaims. Remember this Christmas season that Christ died for you, that His birth is truly a reason to rejoice. He did it because He loves you and NOTHING you do can ever change that.

Merry Christmas, my beloved sister,

Kayla

Posted on

Oh Man, This is Love!

Dear sister,

I just finished watching a TV show where a side story was about love. Two characters are discussing it when the romantic asks his literal and cerebral girlfriend to list three reasons why she loves him. She answers matter of factly, because he loves her, he loves their daughter, and he has an amazing physique. He smiles. Then she asks him why he loves her: “I don’t need a reason.” She smiles coyly and shyly says how romantic that was. My own left-brain spins its own questions: Is love something that I will never be able to define, only feel? Can I lose or forget it? Will it really last forever? I hear my friends tell my daughter they love her and I tell my nieces and nephews that I love them. Is this the same love I have for my own daughter and husband?

I scanned my book titles to help me define love. I found some on adultery, on keeping the marriage pure, rekindling marriage, dating, parenting, and even one on loving to eat and hating to eat. None purely on what love is. Ahhhh, but there is one! It’s the oldest love story ever written and gives the true meaning of love. It tells of a married couple living in a garden who made a life ending choice that deserved death. They didn’t die right away because love promised them a deliverer to pay for their evil choice. They decided to trust in this promise and love gave them life.

Their children and children’s children continued to choose to do evil yet some of them put their trust in love’s promised deliverer. This deliverer would come and defeat the death that cursed their lives. Those who trusted in this promised one who defines love, lived forever with no curse! Then one day it happened…the promised deliverer came to earth to live like us as man, but who never chose to do evil. He lived a perfect life, loving God the Father and loving all mankind. Then in this love, he died. He was tortured and killed because of this love. But on the third day…he rose again! He conquered the curse that gives death and put His love on all those that trust and believe in Him. And this love will bring him back again to take those who trust Him to paradise!

Oh man, this is love! God is love. Jesus is love. 1 John 4:9-11 says: “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 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 totally committed for another’s good. Love dies for the unlovely. Love serves the ungrateful. Love is faithful though His friends and family are not. “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, 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” (1 Cor 13:4-8a).

So YES!! Love can be defined…God is love. Because of what Jesus did on the cross, defeating death and giving us His righteousness I can never lose or forget love. And YES!! It really does last forever. Do we need a reason to love? It may be romantic to say no, but how amazing is it to have the ultimate reason to love not only our husbands, children, family, and friends, but also all our neighbors? Jesus is this reason. Is your love defined by Him? Sweet sister, do you love others because Christ loves you? What a great time of year to answer this question as we remember when love came down to earth. Merry Christmas!

Colleen