“Now faith, hope and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”
I Cor. 13:13

When it comes to love, are we able to be selective? By this question I mean are we able to select just who we will love, and those who will not be loved by us? But if we are able to be selective in our loving, doesn’t this lead us to a greater question; is that really love?

That question may sound strange at first hearing because it does seem to run counter to what we just read in Paul’s epistle. As a parent, there was more than one time when I felt it imperative to pass out some form of punishment to one of my five children. I would offer and I meant it, “this is going to hurt me more than you”, because even if they needed it I still loved them.

What does your faith say when it comes to making a judgment call? Things happen and when they do, what determines how we react? Are we as God’s children, God’s family here on earth, simply to love everybody? Before we can really come up with a sound answer, it will do well for us to define just exactly what we mean when we say, “I will love.”

If we look into the word love as found in our dictionary, we would find it is so completely defined as to make it very difficult to choose exactly what it is we mean by living it. St. Paul gave us a beautiful description of what ‘to love’ means for all who wish to live In Christ! In chapter 12, Paul had just run through what it means to live Christ’s spirit. He concludes by saying, “I will show you a still more excellent way.” (12. 31b). That more excellent way is to allow Christ’s love to grow in us and then to live it in all the ways in which life confronts us.

Prayer

Heavenly Father, You have given us life and all that we need to live it, but when it comes to tough choices as to who deserves to receive our love, show us the better way, the love we have received from Christ our Lord, love that comes even when we haven’t deserved it. Help us to live in His Love we pray. Amen.