How to Get Back to The Basics of Love

I believe that love is one of our greatest adventures.  It’s the giving away of ourselves, down to the very core, including every single vulnerability that we have.  It’s allowing someone access to the deepest parts of us and trusting them with it.  It’s not holding back but letting go.  It’s fully, freely, and completely opening our hearts.  It can be one of the scariest things we do but also one of the most profound. 

The only way we will live this life full is to let God be love in us.   

What is getting back to the basics?

The last couple of weeks we have been talking about what it means to “Get Back to the Basics”.  When we hit a season in life that throws us for a loop, circumstances we didn’t expect, what do we do? Where and how do we start over again?

Jesus spoke in Matthew 22 saying,

Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together.  One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Matthew 22:34-39 NIV

Getting back to the basics means loving God and loving people.  So how do we do that?

First, we take inventory.

Last week we took inventory of our hearts and our eyes.  How did that go for everyone?  Did you dig into the questions and have self-reflection time?  It’s never fun to be corrected, but as we humble ourselves before the Father healing begins to take place and we can now begin to get back to the basics!   

Next, we define what love is.

If we are going to dive into what loving God and loving people looks like, we should first define what love is. A great friend and mentor of mine, Andy Taylor, says, “We can only love to the degree that we ourselves understand love.”  What a true statement!  If we are going to love well, we need to open our hearts and open our minds.  We need to rid ourselves of any old way of thinking about love based on past relationships and circumstances and start to walk in the kind of love we read about in God’s word.

Love is patient, love is kind.  It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no records of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.  It always protect, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  Love never fails. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a (NIV)

These are very familiar verses in the bible on love!  I know you have heard them before.  But what if we took the time to really read them.  To dissect them.  To let the Father revolutionize how we understand them.  And then applied them to our everyday life.

These verses tell us what love is, but also what it isn’t.  If we are truly going to love God and love people, we must open our hearts to this kind of selfless love.  We can’t hold back but walk boldly in it. 

What does love mean to you?  How have your experiences and circumstances in the past shaped your view on love today?

I encourage you to take some time this week to really think about and define what love is to you.  Write it down on your journal sheet found here.  Then read the entire chapter of 1 Corinthians 13 and journal about what the Father speaks to you. 

I believe with all my heart that the only way we truly will live this life full is to walk in the fullness of love.  It is the most excellent way.  (1 Corinthians 13:1 NIV)

With love,

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