I've been dwelling on this for days, and I think the best way to understand what I believe is to write it down. So here we go.
Let me clarify: this post is about romantic love (between a man and woman), not the agape love God shows us. I could write for years about God's love and still not come close to describing its perfection. I'm just hoping to keep it to a few paragraphs here.
So I'm going to start with the main idea here: Jesus showed us how to love, so love cannot exist apart from Him. Now, I'm not saying nonbelievers can't love, as its obvious in many cases that they can. However, their love ultimately comes from God, even if they don't know it. Some Christians seem to miss this point a lot though. How else do you explain the divorce rate among them? I've heard all the arguments: “we didn't have any chemistry,” “she just wasn't the one,” “he doesn't understand me.” Bull crap. Maturity is the issue here. Everyone goes through rough spots in their relationships, but if you cut and run instead of working it out, you're the one responsible. The difference between a relationship that lasts and one that doesn't is maturity.
Now let me go deeper into this whole maturity thing. When I say maturity, I'm not talking about age, experience, or any other standard often used to determine maturity. What I mean by maturity is the quality in a person that reflects the character of God and runs to the area of conflict, not away. Jesus does mention in Matthew 5:32 that divorce is okay in cases of infidelity. I would even argue that holds for marriages which are continuously abusive. Any other reason is probably not going to cut it. God says in Malachi 2:16 that He hates divorce, and understandably so. God has suffered through the greatest divorce of all time: the divorce of His creation from Him. That is essentially what Genesis 3 is all about. Even so, God understands when unfaithfulness separates a couple, keeping them trusting each other again. But God pursued us despite our sin, despite our adultery against Him. He gave His life to be with us again. That's why the Church is called the “bride” of Christ. It's because of this reason that I have tremendous respect for couples who are willing to stick together even when adultery happens. I'm not condoning affairs (they're despicable), but if a relationship can weather that storm, it's practically invincible.
What about relationships before marriage? Perhaps there are fewer Biblical verses and other metaphors to apply here, but we can still learn a lot from Christ. The key difference between dating and marriage is the fact that it's okay to break up. There are no vows made before God to stay committed, so breaking up, though it may be painful, is not a sin. However, I still believe a lot of things hold true in a relationship. For one, it's vital to keep God in focus and at the center of the relationship. I imagine it, since I'm a visual person, as a triangle. The man and woman are the two corners at the bottom, and God is the point at the top. The man and woman each have their own personal relationship with God, one which nothing can take away. But they also have a relationship with one another. Without God, though, the relationship is one-dimensional and has nothing to hold it together during the hard times. This happens often with couples who don't have a solid relationship with God, to the point where they become each others' idols. With God though, there is a a constant; an unchanging, immovable constant. He is the foundation which holds the universe together. With faith from both sides, He can hold any relationship together.
That said, there are numerous reasons why breaking up is alright. While, ideally, every relationship could eventually turn into marriage, sometimes people just move in two different directions. In that case it could be that God is calling each person to a separate place, with a separate plan for each. Please, please though, carefully ask God if that is indeed his plan. Sometimes we hear Him wrong, and there's no reason to break up unless you are confident you heard Him right. And whatever you do, do not use that as an excuse to break up. That's just dumb. In the end, the goal of every relationship should be learning to love and serve one another.
So what is love? (Baby don't hurt me). I don't believe love is technically an emotion. We often pervert the true meaning of the word by using it as such. But let's be honest, we love our families and our friends, but do we really always like them? Who among all the people that you love has never gotten on your nerves at least once (and most likely many, many times)? Therefore, love is something else. I believe that something else is a commitment. Feelings come and go, but if there is a commitment behind the relationship, feelings don't matter as much. Jesus commands us to love our enemies even though we don't, and may never, like them. That is why Jesus is the key to understanding love. There are people who go in and out of relationships wondering why they always fail. The answer is all around them, and that answer loves them dearly. But even those who are happily married, I'm sure, learn something new about love everyday. That's just part of learning to live like Christ. You may not have ever experienced a relationship before, but as long as you love and pursue Jesus as He loves and pursues us, you can know what love is.
So what do you all think?
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