Love Is A Choice

    It’s a simple four letter word that says so much.  I like to say that love is not a feeling but
a choice. 

    One thing I have come to realize that it’s so much easier
love those that love you back and you get along with naturally.  It’s a whole lot harder to love those that
you don’t naturally get along with and harder to connect with.  Yes, I’ve known this for a while but the Lord
has really been showing me and has been teaching me that I shouldn’t pick who I
want to love.  I shouldn’t love anyone
less or more because of how they act or who they are.

    The Bible is
very clear about the word love. What it
means. How to love others. And whom I am to love.  God tells us that the first and greatest
commandment is to love the Lord your God with ALL our heart, soul and
mind.  (Matthew 22:37-39) And the second
it like it; Love your neighbor as yourselves.  He even says to love your enemies.  (Matthew 5:43-44)   And actually it’s very simple to love! Haha You
see in 1John is clearly states that if we love God and abide in Him than love is
perfected in us and as we put Christ first loving Him with all our hearts, that
love will flow out onto others around you. 

1 John 4:7-13

    ⁷Beloved, let us love one another, for love is
(springs) from God; and he who loves [his fellowmen] is begotten (born) of God
and is coming [progressively] to know and understand God [to perceive and
recognize and get a better and clearer knowledge of Him].
    ⁸He who does not love
has not become acquainted with God [does not and never did know Him], for God
is love.
    ⁹In this the love of
God was made manifest (displayed) where we are concerned: in that God sent His
Son, the only begotten or ^[f]unique [Son], into the world so
that we might live through Him.
    ¹⁰In this is love: not
that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation
(the atoning sacrifice) for our sins.
    ¹¹Beloved, if God loved
us so [very much], we also ought to love one another.
    ¹²No man has at any
time [yet] seen God. But if we love one another, God abides (lives and remains)
in us and His love (that love which is essentially His) is brought to
completion (to its full maturity, runs its full course, is perfected) in us!

    ¹³By this we come to
know (perceive, recognize, and understand) that we abide (live and remain) in
Him and He in us: because He has given (imparted) to us of His [Holy] Spirit.

    But, choosing to walk
out this love is a choice.  For instance,
being here in India the last three months I have had the choice to walk in love
towards the girls on my team.  I have had
the choice allow God’s love to resonant from me.  I have had the choice to not only love the girls
on my team but the women I work with. 
The children I minister to.  The
Preschoolers.  The children at tuition.  Even when they don’t listen!  I have had the choice to love them.  I have had the choice to not only walk in
love towards the people I have naturally fallen in love with.  But I have had the choice to love the husband
that beats the women I adore.  I have the
choice to love the parents that neglect, and abuse the very child that want to
be my own.  I have had the choice to walk
in love towards the rude and arrogant men on the buses.  I have had the choice to walk in love
wherever I go.  Every person I come across
should experience God’s love through me. 
But it’s my choice to walk out that love. 

I will end with 1
Corinthians where it states that without love, anything we ever do as
Christians amounts to nothing.  And then,
it gives the best definition of love there could ever be and how to walk out
that love.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8  

    ¹If I [can] speak in
the tongues of men and [even] of angels, but have not love (that reasoning,
intentional, spiritual devotion such ^[a]as is inspired by
God’s love for and in us), I am only a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
    ²And
if I have prophetic powers (^[b]the gift of interpreting the divine
will and purpose), and understand all the secret truths and mysteries and
possess all knowledge, and if I have [sufficient] faith so that I can remove
mountains, but have not love (God’s love in me) I am nothing (a useless
nobody).
    ³Even
if I dole out all that I have [to the poor in providing] food, and if I
surrender my body to be burned or ^[c] in
order that I may glory, but have not love (God’s love in me), I gain nothing.
    ⁴Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never
is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does
not display itself haughtily.
    ⁵It is not conceited
(arrogant and inflated with pride); it is not rude (unmannerly) and does not
act unbecomingly. Love (God’s love in us) does not insist on its own rights or
its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or
resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it [it pays no attention to
a suffered wrong].
    ⁶It does not rejoice
at injustice and unrighteousness, but rejoices when right and truth prevail.
    ⁷Love bears up under
anything and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every
person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures
everything [without weakening].

    ⁸Love never fails
[never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end]

I’m choosing to walk in love….. ALWAYS