Love, it’s a wonderful thing. It is what relationships are rooted in, what we thrive on, what we need more of in families, churches and society.
Love is easy, even fun and gratifying when there is genuine gratitude, joyful reception, productivity and reciprocity, but what do we do when Love doesn’t seem to be working.
I love the lighter side of love, it’s the side we find most joy in, and the perspective of love you’ll see in most of my photos of Rwanda and Love Alive’s website. This fruitful side of love inspires us to continue in compassion and good will toward others.
In all honesty, this is the cuddles and fluff of love; Love in its most ideal. But what do we do when Love isn’t exactly fun, when it isn’t easy, when it is a struggle?
What if you go out of your way to help someone, sacrificially giving of your time, efforts, emotion, and resources only for them to turn against you, spread evil against you?
Love is Patient.

What do you do when you have gone without or your own children have gone without in order to bless someone else and yet they squander what you have given.
Love is Kind.

Are we really to keep loving when we have given our all, having nothing left to give financially, physically, emotionally or spiritually, and the very people we are trying to help not only deceive us, but steal from us? Do we stop? Do we scream this is enough? Do we cry out that this “love thing” is just not working?
Love Bears All Things.

What about when you give a gift knowing it can be well used for a profitable manner for the other person, and yet the recipient seems to take no initiative to use the gift well, and your efforts seem vain?
Love Hopes All Things.

What about when your love does not seem to be enough. You’ve given your utmost, but more is needed. More is wanted. The begging continues. Your attempts to show you have nothing left to give are met with scorn, rejection and hatred.
Love Endures All Things.

Can we quit loving? Can we throw up our hands and tell God those people just can’t be loved, that it’s just not worth it?
Love Never Ends.

All of us have been there. Parent, pastors, teachers, social workers, missionaries, and citizens looking out for the best interest of others. We love to the full, and have an experience that makes us wonder if it was all for naught. We are tempted to say, “That’s the last time I’ll…..” Yet we are called to a higher standard. The words of Jesus Christ to us are “Love as I love you.” That is a powerful love. A love that loves me when I don’t fully appreciate, when I fail to use the gifts and potential He has given, when I am far less than deserving, when I do not love fully in return. A love that went to the cross, knowing full well, many would reject His gift of Love and Salvation.
1 Corinthians 13
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

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