Love Seeketh Not Her Own
We seem to have confused a lot of different ‘stuff’’ as love. Wanting someone or something that is for someone else is not love – it is covetousness. When one desires someone else’s person, place or thing(s), one is breaking a commandment of Love – thou shalt not covet. When one desires sex out of wedlock, from anyone or anything, one is breaking one and maybe two commandments of Love - thou shalt have no other gods before me and thou shalt not commit adultery.
When we impose our desires and/or will over God’s, we place our desires and/or ourselves as gods.
As you consider the above, please consider it thinking of yourself and your alignment with God's will, not someone else. We should read the Bible as if we are looking in the mirror. James says in 1:23 and 24, "For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass...he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was." We need to know what we are seeking from love and those around us, and examine our motives individually, not the motives of those around us.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
42 Lovers
1Corinthians 13: 4 (a) “Charity suffereth long, and is kind;”
I look at the partial verse above and I think, “We have gone a LONG way from the truth”. Charity (or love) suffereth long…. In today’s society, it seems that suffering is viewed with the same displeasure or hatred that I believe SIN once was. NOW, our society tells us to SIN rather than SUFFER. However, I recently participated in an event and I saw a different application of suffering that gave me hope for today and our future.
42 men and women (35 men and 7 women) took time out of their normal schedules and for about 2 months subjected themselves to dancing. “Subjected themselves to dancing”, you say? How is THAT suffering? Well, if you have never learned to count 1-2-3, 2-2-3, 3-2-3, 4-2-3, and keep in step to that count, and learned to spin, and bow or curtsey, or reverse spin, then trust me, you are subjecting yourself to dancing – more specifically, to the dance of waltzing.
I saw (because of my injury, I suffered the ridicule of NOT being able to participate in the waltz) 42 men and women subject themselves to arduous dance routines that I believe ONLY LOVE inspired them to endure. They did the waltz, not because they had to, but because they wanted to demonstrate their love to their child, their niece, their nephew, or their friend.
The Kansas City chapter of Delta Sigma Theta (DST) Cotillion was the conduit that enabled these 42 lovers to demonstrate their love, but it was the selflessness of the 42 lovers that impressed me that “some of us have the definition of love right”. The 42 lovers (and 42 participants) suffered LONG, with GREAT reward. When the formal presentation event was held on April 3, 2010 in Kansas City, Missouri, the 42 lovers and participants glistened against the applause and admiration of the 600 plus attendees of the 25th annual DST Cotillion Ball.
Being kind seems to have gone the way of dinosaurs – become extinct. Rudeness is the way of the day. You are not cool if you are not rude. And yet, societal controls say, rude leads to crude, which leads to lewd, which often leads to crime – crime, which is glorified in the popular songs of today. We think, "Singing about it [crime] does not popularize it". “Singing about it [crime] does not promote it.” “Demonstrating acts of lewdness on television does not promote illicit sex and our children will understand that it is only an illusion that is being played before them.” And then, a major songstress strips naked in public, with children and adults all around. NOW what do we say? The child asks, "Why did she do that"? I ask, “Why did we think she would NOT do it”?
We are reaping the fruits of our crudeness. If we want different fruit, we need to sow different seeds. Let’s take it upon ourselves individually and collectively to sow kind words, considerate words, thoughtful words, words that build character into those who receive them rather than stripping them of their humanity. Let’s sow kind deeds that demonstrate to others that love is an action verb that bestows kindness, and that love is still alive. We can follow the songstress’s example, or we can follow the example of the 42 lovers. As for me, I plan to follow the example of the 42 lovers.
I look at the partial verse above and I think, “We have gone a LONG way from the truth”. Charity (or love) suffereth long…. In today’s society, it seems that suffering is viewed with the same displeasure or hatred that I believe SIN once was. NOW, our society tells us to SIN rather than SUFFER. However, I recently participated in an event and I saw a different application of suffering that gave me hope for today and our future.
42 men and women (35 men and 7 women) took time out of their normal schedules and for about 2 months subjected themselves to dancing. “Subjected themselves to dancing”, you say? How is THAT suffering? Well, if you have never learned to count 1-2-3, 2-2-3, 3-2-3, 4-2-3, and keep in step to that count, and learned to spin, and bow or curtsey, or reverse spin, then trust me, you are subjecting yourself to dancing – more specifically, to the dance of waltzing.
I saw (because of my injury, I suffered the ridicule of NOT being able to participate in the waltz) 42 men and women subject themselves to arduous dance routines that I believe ONLY LOVE inspired them to endure. They did the waltz, not because they had to, but because they wanted to demonstrate their love to their child, their niece, their nephew, or their friend.
The Kansas City chapter of Delta Sigma Theta (DST) Cotillion was the conduit that enabled these 42 lovers to demonstrate their love, but it was the selflessness of the 42 lovers that impressed me that “some of us have the definition of love right”. The 42 lovers (and 42 participants) suffered LONG, with GREAT reward. When the formal presentation event was held on April 3, 2010 in Kansas City, Missouri, the 42 lovers and participants glistened against the applause and admiration of the 600 plus attendees of the 25th annual DST Cotillion Ball.
Being kind seems to have gone the way of dinosaurs – become extinct. Rudeness is the way of the day. You are not cool if you are not rude. And yet, societal controls say, rude leads to crude, which leads to lewd, which often leads to crime – crime, which is glorified in the popular songs of today. We think, "Singing about it [crime] does not popularize it". “Singing about it [crime] does not promote it.” “Demonstrating acts of lewdness on television does not promote illicit sex and our children will understand that it is only an illusion that is being played before them.” And then, a major songstress strips naked in public, with children and adults all around. NOW what do we say? The child asks, "Why did she do that"? I ask, “Why did we think she would NOT do it”?
We are reaping the fruits of our crudeness. If we want different fruit, we need to sow different seeds. Let’s take it upon ourselves individually and collectively to sow kind words, considerate words, thoughtful words, words that build character into those who receive them rather than stripping them of their humanity. Let’s sow kind deeds that demonstrate to others that love is an action verb that bestows kindness, and that love is still alive. We can follow the songstress’s example, or we can follow the example of the 42 lovers. As for me, I plan to follow the example of the 42 lovers.
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