TO LIVE IS TO LOVE (Part 3) #InTheseTimes

Many years ago, before my parents moved into their own house, we lived in a rented apartment with two other tenants. Occasionally, I heard arguments, which most times led to the sounds of a physical scuffle and then beatings from one of the tenants. They got in as newlyweds and their marriage was still less than a year.

Oftentimes, the wife would run to our house for safety and the man would come begging her to return home. Whenever the pandemonium ensued at night, my mum had been moved a couple of times to allow her to stay overnight. It was such an ugly experience.

A year later, we moved to our own place, but my heart still ached for the young couple. How did they end up like that? What does the future hold for them? How can they raise healthy children in such an environment? They appeared to have what can be described as a fair-weather love.
They only loved each other when it was convenient for them. This resulted in a shaky love affair; two days of love and two days of war.
I don’t want to write more about them. I am glad I have a good example in my parents of how a home should be and how couples should relate with one another.

We cannot overemphasize the subject matter of love. It is so wide and all-encompassing. Love is the most powerful treasure we can possess on earth. The scripture says that love is the greatest.
“And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.” (1 Corinthians 13:13)

For single or married people, love is the way to live. When a single man or woman daily learns and grows in love, it will transcend into living happily and lovingly with their spouse when they eventually get married.
To start with, love is a practice of acceptance; accepting God for His supremacy and serving Him with this knowledge; accepting yourself for your strengths and weaknesses; and accepting others for the same.

Love brings us to a place of wisdom and peace. We are able to flow with the energy and consciousness of the Supreme God.
Love’s transcendent power brings our soul to a state of wisdom and divine awareness. We begin to think the thoughts of God and act like Him.
No wonder the scriptures says in 1 John 4:7-8, that “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.” 

Experiencing God’s love personally is connected with loving our spouse. Here’s the truth, until I have learned to love myself, I cannot fully love another person. But I can only learn to love myself when I have allowed the love of God to flow into me.

Loving our spouse begins with loving ourselves. Love will inspire and motivate every thought and action towards our significant other. Beyond the physical attraction, love unites two souls to become one.
Many homes today are a wreck because the Author of Love, God, is absent. These partners have not yet found that peaceful place of love within themselves so they cannot give it.

It is difficult for the devil to come in between two “love-full” people. When the man as the head of the house has died to self and is now being controlled by the Spirit of Love, and the wife also has this experience too, there will be a fulfillment of the scripture in their home; “and a threefold cord is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12).

Love is more than a feeling, it is an attitude. An attitude that propels you to do everything possible to make your spouse happy. “This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you” (John 15:12).
Many married people just want to get what the other person can offer. They want their partner to be the one to act right always without playing their own part.
You don’t get married to be served but to serve. Love is not meant to be an idealistic aspiration that only exists theoretically.
It is practical and realistic. Setting selfish and unrealistic goals as singles can lay a foundation for a broken home. Love is selfless and unconditional.

And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. (1 John 4:16)
Everyone who aims for a peaceful home must understand what pure and undefiled agape love is. They must carry Love, God, in them. And they must be a giver of love.
Dear friend, whatever stage you are in life, allow love to lead you to a place of peace, wisdom, and power.