What is love, anyway?

YOU’D maybe not guess it from looking at me (middle aged and a bit, male, and rotund!) but I am a fan of Tina Turner. If I need cheering up or motivating to walk a bit further with the dog, or if I want to belt out a tune to myself, I find her renditions of River Deep, Mountain High and Proud Mary do the trick.

Another classic is What’s Love Got To Do With It? It struck me that there are so many songs of all genres, which ask this kind of question. It’s like musicians are obsessed with love! But what is love, anyway?

A few years ago, I was going through a tough time with someone at my then place of work. One Sunday, the sermon was on the subject of loving your enemy – something that Jesus asks us to do. I instantly felt a failure – there was no way on earth that I could do that. Fortunately, the minister was wise and she explained that love can take many flavours and nuances, so ‘loving your enemy’ could mean that you actively want the best for them. This, I could live with.

More recently, another wise friend was explaining that bit in the Bible which is often read at weddings … along the lines of ‘you can talk and do all you want but if you do it without love, then you’re like a clashing gong’ – does that sound familiar? I’ve read it at a friend’s wedding myself, and I still found it hard to understand. Well, my friend boiled it down to this golden nugget: “Whatever you do or say in life, if you do it or say it without love, then it’s all just noise. Love is the glue that holds us all together.”

Love is a subject that can always be relevant , whether we are in the darkest valleys or walking in the sunlit uplands of life.

We’ve just had Easter, and nearly two millennia after the first Easter time, when the followers of Jesus experienced the darkest of times at the crucifixion and also the elation of those sunlit uplands with His resurrection, I pause and reflect that this sacrifice was the ultimate expression of love for each and every one of us – a gift of love that is ours to accept, if we choose.

It turns out then, that Love is not the question.

Love is the answer.

Wishing you peace.

Love, Ed