Choose Thy Love
An Essay on Romantic Love
Society paints love as temporary and replaceable. Love to the world is all about passion and sex. Growing up with the world screaming thoughts like this at you is burdensome. Movies show us that love is either unrealistically perfect or the worst thing that could ever happen to you. Society teaches children that everything is surface level. Men need to be strong, emotionless, and good at sports: while women need to be sexy, gossip, and like dressing up. The world has changed something that God created to be specific and intimate and twisted the meaning to shallow and shellfish.
Thankfully I have had wise people in my life to help me understand love. A past teacher of mine once said, “ Choose thy love and love thy choice.” Her words have stuck with me throughout the past few years. She taught me that love is a choice. She would be open about the struggles she was with her husband. But, she always made it a point to let us know that she chose to work on her relationship every day.
My best friend’s boyfriend Ashton is a know-it-all. But, in the best way. He will always do his best to make sure that he can give the best biblical advice. Ashton once told me,” Love is a choice, harder some days than not. But, real love won’t ever fail. And the most incredible example of biblical love, unmatched and incomparable, is Christ’s yearning for us”. Ashton taught me that unless I understand God’s adoration: I will never be able to love anyone.
I think that love is something that you choose and work hard at every day. I am not saying that you can love anyone you choose. Many factors play into choosing who you love. But, when you find the right person, you have to choose to love them every day. Too many people think that love should be perfect and that faultless person is waiting for them. News flash, no human is perfect. Therefore no human relationship is perfect.
C.S. Lewis said,” Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You can not make it the basis of a whole life”. C.S. Lewis is saying that too many people base the entirety of their lives around finding infatuation. They waste all their time worrying and hunting for “the one.” When in reality, emotion happens when you are not looking for it at all.
The Bible describes what love is in 1 Corinthians 13:4–5. It gives many examples of what love is and is not. It says,” love is patient and kind.” Meaning that when you love someone, you show more emotions than affection and lust. The Bible is not describing romantic human infatuation in this verse. The author is defining what biblical love is. He is saying that love had intended to be so much more than passion and chemistry.
Lastly, in the book Blue Like Jazz, author Donald Miller says, “ I will give you this, my love, and I will not bargain or barter any longer. I will love you, as sure as He has loved me.” I think Miller has described biblical love beautifully. Miller says that without knowing true love, God’s mercy: he would not comprehend true human love. I agree with Miller in this sense. I think the only way to understand love is to grow your romantic relationship with the Lord. God creates a perfect Holy example of what love should be in the Bible. He displays devotion between Christ and the church. The church is not perfect and messes up often. But Christ chooses every day to be forgiving and merciful: showing the church love unconditionally.
I would like to conclude by applying these insights to my future husband:
Dear,
I am beyond grateful that our Lord has put you in my life. It is crazy that our story is utterly circumstantial. With one different decision, the course of both our lives would have been immensely different. The Lord paved the way for us to meet; for that, I am thankful. I pray for you, my love, every day. Prayers that you would be God-fearing, kind, strong, and faithful. I also pray for our future as we grow: for you to be a leader not only to me but to our family to come. I know that I already love everything about you. You have shown me what true humanly love is supposed to be. Thank you for your acceptance of all my imperfections, just as Christ did to the church. God has shown me his love by putting you in my life, and I could not be more grateful. I keep finding new things to love about you every time we are together.
With more love than words can express,
Your wife.
