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Love: The Word We Have Ruined
The word "love" has been quietly ruined in modern English.
We use it for coffee, for songs, for what we would do to a burger given the chance. We say we love our friends, our parents, our spouses, our new trainers, and God, with roughly the same vocabulary and no real distinction between them. The word has been stretched so thin it barely carries weight anymore.
Then we open the Bible and read that God is love, and we do not know what to do with it. Because our English word "love" is not big enough to hold what scripture means when it uses that word.
This week's theme: Love.
Today, why the word we have been using has been quietly failing us, and what the Bible actually means when it uses it.
Start with the most famous chapter in the New Testament on love. Paul in 1 Corinthians 13.
"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour 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." - 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Read it slowly.
Notice what Paul does not do. He does not describe love as a feeling. He does not say "love is a warm sense of affection you have when you look at someone." He does not talk about the butterflies or the chemistry or the emotional connection.
He describes love almost entirely as a set of actions.
Patient. Kind. Not envying. Not boasting. Not being proud. Not dishonouring. Not self-seeking. Not easily angered. Keeping no record of wrongs. Protecting. Trusting. Hoping. Persevering.
Every one of those is something you do, not something you feel. Paul is describing love as a posture, a practice, a decision. Not a mood.
That reframes everything.
Because if love is a feeling, you have to wait for the feeling to come before you can love someone. And if the feeling is not there, you conclude you do not love them anymore, which for many marriages and friendships is where the trouble starts.
If love is a set of actions, you can love someone today, right now, even without the feeling. You can be patient with them. You can be kind. You can keep no record of the last thing they did that hurt you. That is love, whether you feel it or not.
This week we are going to walk through love from several angles. Tomorrow, a woman who wept at Jesus's feet. Wednesday, the specific ways we have been misdefining love in our own lives. Thursday, a practice. Friday, the hard truth about love. Saturday, the Greek. Sunday, Psalm 63.
For now, one question.
Who in your life have you stopped loving because you stopped feeling it?
YOUR ONE THING FOR TODAY
Do one loving action today for someone whose love-feeling has faded. A patient response. A kind word. A refusal to bring up the old wound. Do it without needing to feel anything first. The action is the love.
A PRAYER FOR TODAY
Father, forgive me for waiting to feel love before I have loved. Teach me this week to love the way Paul described it. Actions before feelings. Let me start today. Amen.
OVER TO YOU
Whose love-feeling has faded for you that you could love with actions this week? A word or a line. Every reply read.
God bless you, my friend.
The LowKey Christian
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