Love

I was thinking about our wedding last year. We had so many people there, all of whom knew how our first marriages had fallen apart and were rejoicing with us that we had found each other. 

Then I was thinking how all these people loved me and Troy, and we had done absolutely nothing to receive or deserve that love.

Then I thought about my first marriage and how I spent so much effort in trying to be exactly how he wanted me to be. In short, I was trying to "get" his love, to make him love me. And I failed miserably.

So then I made a few connections. No one can make you love them. You can't make someone love you. What you can do, is do things for the people you do love, not because they deserve it, but because you love them.

This is how God loves us; we don't receive His love, His grace, His gifts because we deserve them. He gives them to us because He loves us. Jesus didn't go to the cross for us because we deserved it. He went because He loved us.

When we think of doing for others, instead of getting for ourselves, that is how we are supposed to love.

This is how I try to love Troy. It is not always easy; having had one marriage fall apart sometimes makes me worry about it happening again. But when I try to do things to make Troy love me, I usually end up feeling foolish and inadequate. But when I act out of love for him, I usually end up knowing we have a solid marriage and that his love for me will always be.

This is why we can't try to "get" God's love. There is no way to deserve it, or to do anything to be "good enough." We can only act out of love for our neighbors, knowing we are already His beloved children. We love because He first loved us.