What is Love?

by Sheila Kraklow
(Denver, Colorado)

About me: I hail from the beautiful state of Colorado. I have lived in other regions of the USA including the Eastern shores of the Atlantic in Maine. I've been everywhere man, from Colorado to Nevada, back to Colorado then to Kentucky, back again and then to Maine. All through the travel I clung to the mighty, comforting hand of the Lord.

I have written 5 children's books, with the illustrations. I am currently writing in a writers group called Helium.com. Married to a wonderful Christian man, with a combined family of 5 children and 7 sweet Grandkids! Ain't life Grand?

Now in my early "Senior years", I am finding new ways to share the love of the Lord to a hurting world, using my God given talent of writing.


Date of Entry: 07/09/08

Scriptures: Romans 13:8, John 15:17, I Peter 4:8,Galatians 6:1,Proverbs 25:21 & 22,1 John 4:7 & 8, Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42, Luke 17:2


My thoughts...

What is Love?

In doing research for this article I looked up the word LOVE in 2 trusted books. The first one being a dictionary. The other source I consulted was the Holy Bible.

From Merriam-Webster I discovered many different routes for love. My paraphrased definition of love is what follows. Love can be, a strong affection for another human and tenderness felt for a lover. I can admire you as my teacher, scout master or Sunday-School teacher. Being enthusiastic for sports can be called love. Having a concern for human kind is love. There is love for a friend, love for your children, you can love ice cream, puppies or the sea. A person can love with devotion and utmost attention, you can be attached to, devoted to, enthusiastic for a vast array of things, people and places. Perhaps this definition must concentrate on the human kind of love, which drags us along sometimes unwillingly. That kind of love that can be overwhelming and never understood.

This dictionary's definition of love can fit many situations. But this, is love? I need more!

The Holy Bible, the most trusted and most often read book ever written. It holds absolute truth and wisdom sent to us from a loving Heavenly Father, this book is the definition of love. From its renowned passages I gleaned many things about love.

All through the ages the Bible has taught men and women to love. The depth and volume we are to love is diverse and complex.

Biblical love is to minister to the needs of others, to love one another, to love clothing the naked, visiting the sick, sympathizing with the sorrowful, supporting the weak. "Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law."(Romans 13:8 NKJV) And one more verse to read is, "These things I command you, that you love one another."(John 15:17 NKJV)

The Bible teaches that love covers mountains and mountains of the faults and failures of others. "And above all things, have fervent love for one another, for love will cover a multitude of sins." (1 Peter 4:8 NKJV). These are the words of the Lord!

I show true beautiful love by forgiving others when they have hurt me or injured me in some way. I am to love by forbearing with others, does that mean putting up with their strange ways, allowing them to be whom or what they are? I show Biblical love by, remarkably, rebuking. I have to stop and examine this one, because I don't know if I want to do this. It appears that if a fellow has done something to offend you, you must, in love, go to that person and tell them about it, and give them a chance to make it right. "Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one, in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted."(Galatians 6:1 NKJV). Well I can do that, but it will come only from love, love for myself and love for the offender.

Who am I to love? The Holy Scriptures state that I am to love the saints, ministers, my family, and my fellow country men. It instructs to love strangers, who, "May come to you as angels and you will not be aware who they really are". We are to love even our enemies, to shower them with love, thereby "heaping on their heads the coals of kindness". "If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; For so you will heap coals of fire (kindness) on his head." (Proverbs 25:21 & 22)

However still I am wondering what is love? It seems to be forming in my mind as a tangible thing that I am able to: put on, follow after, abound in, continue in, and provoke others to. I can be sincere in or disinterested in love, and I can be, oh so fervent in sexual love.

I want more, I want to know what love is!

In this search for the meaning of love I found very little on the subject in the modern day dictionary compared to the Holy Bible. I feel quite unable to find the meaning, and I feel unable to love, I mean a total giving of myself to other humans, to really care?

At a loss to really pinpoint a definition I can hold in my hand, I asked this pertinent question. "Then Who, is love". Since I am finding that love has a body, a purpose, a form, and is required for humans to be happy, healthy and whole. But who is it that can offer all these attributes in one person? Who, I demand!

My devoted reader, it is God. He IS love, He created love, He ordains love, He demands love. God who created all things has given us a gift, the capacity to love, and longing to be loved, and the talents and abilities to give love. "Beloved let us love one another, for love is of God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love, does not know God, for God is love." (I John 4:7 & 8)

We are to love the unlovely. To reach out to those who are lost in that ugly sea of loneliness, to never forget the desperate people there on the streets. We are to go to the prisons, hospitals and the alleyways to seek out the ones only He loves, and with His power to offer these the gift of love. "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were cast into the sea, then that he would offend one of these little ones." {Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42 & Luke 17:2) These little ones could be those we ignore, or deem as less than.

The Bible says that love never ends. I suppose it can die, it can be hidden, it can be withheld and bent, but love in its many forms can not end. The One who gave love does He end? Dare we ask? For who knows the beginning and the end of God? He is eternal, everlasting, ever present in the world and all powerful. Not unlike God Himself is His creation LOVE, for IT is eternal and everlasting, ever present in our world and all powerful.

So ends my quest for "What is love." I am at last satisfied, for I know love. I know love from a gracious mother, I know love from family, friends and am truly content now in my own attempts at love. Love comes to me in its many forms, shapes and directions. I have found love in my dear husbands arms and have learned how to give love back to him. Where I used to ignore the "un-lovely" I can now see them, and offer what little I have to help, in love.

I can accept others, for God accepts me... therefore I must give Him the right to love them as He loves me, acknowledging the ugly truth, that indeed I am one of the un-lovely.

I must love as I am loved, and I am not afraid to do just that. Love is all there is, we are to seek it, walk in it, give it away, keep His love in our hearts. We can fill the world with love, change lives, we can change the world with God's love!


Questions it brought to my mind...
What can I do to show/give/teach God's love?

My closing prayer...
Lord Jesus, Please reach down from heaven and apply these scriptures to our hearts, give us strength to love. Let it not be as the world loves, that is not your love; but with your eyes Lord let us see the unlovely, let us hear the cry of the lonely and let us Dear God, apply the oil of love to those you bring our way. Amen, thank you Lord!

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