St. Valentine's Day and Love

I believe that the Greeks had it correct. We use one word, love, as a means to describe a rather wide range of emotions and relationships. On the other hand the Greeks had multiple words to be used depending on the type of relationship and/or the depth of feelings involved.

They had a word to describe love for an inanimate object such as a pair of old shoes or a favorite piece of clothing or your abode. It was a love that could not be returned, but nevertheless there were emotions involved for this inanimate object.

Then there was a different word that spoke of the love that you have for friends and casual relationships. While we have several words that attempt to bring about an expression of this particular connection they just do not approach the level achieved by the Greeks. And still another word for describing relationships that were with family and/or others, but at a deeper level.

Then there was their word that illustrated an emotional and physical relationship that one person will have with another. The sex-traders have high jacked Eros and made it sound dirty, but when used within the Greek context it is quite beautiful because it involved more than just the physical relationship, but an extremely deep emotional connection as well. Soul-mate comes close, but does not embrace the full extent or depth that the Greeks understood about a lasting relationship between two people.

The fifth Greek word, Agape, was a self-sacrificing, self-giving word which meant that you gave 100% of yourself to a person or a purpose – holding nothing back regardless of the personal cost. The best example of this kind of love was Jesus’ willingness to accept the Cross and the dynamics of the consequences of that painful death all for the purpose of freeing us from our self-centered decisions called sin.

Today is St. Valentine's Day. It is a day when any one of these descriptive words for love could come into play when attempting to express one’s feelings for somebody important in your life. It has long been my belief that divorce is most likely if only the first four kinds of love are to be found in a marriage. While being in love with the object (the concept of marriage itself) is important – you will need to want to be married and in love with the idea of being married to make marriage work; a couple should be each others best friend – this often takes a life time to achieve; the emotional and physical side of a relationship is vital and a tremendous gift from the Creator; but it is the selfless and sacrificial dynamic that makes a marriage long lasting.

Those couples who shared that they have “just fallen out of love,” or “grown apart,” etc. are people who have limited their definition of love to only the first four. The reality is that there is a day here and a day there that you really want to take your spouse to the highest mountain, push them off and tell God they slipped. At those “reality points” is when the Agape type of love needs to take over allowing two people to once again fall in love with each other. After all it is “for better and for worse” … just make sure that there is more “better” days then there are “worse” days. And, there will be if Agape is present!

Quote for today: "Whoever loves much, does much.” Thomas a’ Kempis