Love is a choice. Someone who has seen a person and believes they love them because of their physical outward appearance has chosen lust. When I met my wife for the first time, I loved her; I did not lust her. She is a beautiful woman. She was the day I met her and she still is, and has been all the days I have known her. Over those days her outward appearance has changed, but not her beauty. She is not perfect (nor am I) and we have had times of trouble, but her beauty never faded. Once or twice my eye may have wondered, but my heart never did. During the hard times we choose to love one another, even when it looked and felt like we didn’t.
If it was love at first sight, how was it a choice? I could have chosen lust, and during the hard years lust would have failed us. Love is what I can give; lust is what I can get. When the getting wasn’t what I wanted, the lusting would have ended. Love gives in the hard times, and does react to what is being returned with thankfulness. Love endures until it is again in full bloom; and the later is greater than the former.
Men, if your wife isn’t the most beautiful woman in the world, the fault isn’t with her but with the choices you have made. Likewise women, if you husband is no longer your prince in shining armor; it is because of choices you have made. Love gives in the times when it doesn’t look or feel like he is your prince or she is the most beautiful. Think of it as a seed. The seed is planted in the earth when there is no sign of the fruit of the plant – in fact what is being planted is the seed of the fruit you hope to harvest. So it is with love.
Now think about our relationship with God, and the times it looks or feels like He no longer favors us. If our relationship with God is based on what we get, will it last through the times we don’t feel like we are getting anything? God has told us He will always be with us. God has made a choice to love. Have we made the same choice, to love Him? God has planted His seed in us; the Holy Spirit who grows love in us. Do we choose to love God even when we do not see the fruit of what was planted in us? Do we continue to love one another, even when we don’t yet see the fruit growing in the other person? Love is what we give, by choice. We plant the seed of love hoping to see the fruit grow in time. That is how God is with us – He plants in us (has us, His servants plant in one another) the seed of love. And He waits, by choice.
“Is the seed still in the barn? As yet the vine, the fig tree, the pomegranate, and the olive tree have not yielded fruit. But from this day I will bless you” (Haggai 2:19).