[NOTE: This is the second of a multi-part series on the subject of love, lovers, and loving. To read the first post in this series, please follow the link HERE.]

When you love you should not say, “God is in my heart,”
but rather, “I am in the heart of God.”
And think not you can direct the course of love, for love,
if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
-Kahlil Gibran, ‘THE PROPHET: On Love’

Three Stages of Ol Suit.

I wish to move now to the description of the relational-forms these different manifestations of love assume. It is my intention to say something about each one of these that might help to sharpen our view of how we ought to let love live out its God-given role in our lives. This will not be an exhaustive treatment of the subject. Much will remain to be said when I am done and you will think of much of that which remains to be said. My advice to you is simple: “Say it.” Add your comments to my own where you think my answer is incomplete and correct me where you think I am in error. 

PARENT-CHILD LOVE

             It is, I believe, no accident of language that God has chosen to reveal Himself to us as “the Heavenly Father“. There is much unarticulated yet fully communicated in that word. We all know a “bad father” when we see one…distinguished primarily by the absence of the basic traits and characteristics that define “fatherhood”. There is a picture here (in healthy parental love) of God-love, for the first love of the parent (whether of mother or father) is independent of the love of the child for the parent. The child, not yet able to freely choose, cannot choose to love the parent back – still the (good) parent continues to lavish his love upon the little one. 

Parents & Child

            Just so, the Heavenly Father lavishes His love upon us long before we are aware. He nourishes and cherishes us, sustains and protects us, guides and blesses us…all while we consume His mercies with a spirit ignorant of their Great Giver. 

            Poets and preachers have heralded such love. Stories of the selfless love of a parent for their child – especially to the point of death – move us as no others. Here is our first window into a world greater than the one ascertained by our senses; a world in which we encounter spiritual realities so much more vast than the stars of space. Here we have the first hint that we are more than carbon-based life-forms moving toward a point of reabsorption by the Universe. In this, the first love we encounter in life, we see the very shadow and outline of God. 

HUSBAND-WIFE LOVE 

            I will not spend so much time here as, 1) I do not believe you all to be ignorant of this subject and, 2) this is what will occupy the greatest part of our six-part series. 

            Suffice it to say that, upon earth, no relationship is more capable of experiencing the full-force of the complete range of the love God makes possible to us than that which is potential between husband and wife. 

            In this relationship all of the Loves (though I would prefer that we understood “the loves” as not being separate from each other but inextricably unified as along the lines of the connectedness and unity of the Holy Trinity) …all of the Loves ought to be fully employed to serve the purpose of sharing one’s self with the other. 

           In the husband-wife relationship, Storge (need-love) finds its most mature expression by a mutual and freely-willed agreement to need or rely upon the other…and this is, of course, reciprocated by our willingness to supply the needs of our mate.

 

Husband & Wife

         Phileo comes into full-flower in the human bond between a God-blessed union of man and woman. How must the devil, who first divided between woman and man and, then, between them and God, cringe when he witnesses a godly couple overcoming their individual selfishness and self-centeredness to deeply explore and ultimately spiritually connect with one another! When the natural dissimilarities which exist between male and female – to say nothing of that which exists between any two human beings – are overthrown or (what is better!) redeemed and made to serve the good of the marriage and of the larger world, how can Satan console himself? It must be for this reason chiefly, among other contributing factors, that the Adversary ceaselessly wars against the home and the family. How distressing to him to witness the undoing of all he schemed to achieve in seducing Adam and Eve in the Garden. Phileo, sanctified by God and made to serve His holy purposes in marriage, truly introduces and bonds two souls to each other and makes possible that deeper union which Eros and Agape will complete. 

            Eros[1] becomes, not the raging fire of a pagan god at war with the purposes of the God Who is God, but rather eros becomes the humble servant of the will of that holy God…the God Who wills us to be one…one in labor, one in spirit, one in intention, and one in the fulfillment of His will upon the earth. Eros then comes to the bed of husband and wife no longer to dictate which of them will rule, but which of them will serve. Not to determine which of them will be pleasured but to help both to please and serve the other. I know this is an awkward subject as Christians largely ignore ‘The Song of Solomon’ and other sacred erotic literature in Scripture, but eros was no error. As has been elsewhere noted, eros is also a creature of God…not the invention of Satan. 

Eros

           What passion might we be capable of attaining and sustaining if we took to our present mates our whole selves? How would our beds be transformed into altars if we approached them with the complete understanding that the God Who made us to serve Him made us to serve Him there, too? How might the bond between husband and wife be enhanced if each one saw that all love was and is designed to bring us to God and to each other? And that it is through this kind of loving relationship (a kind of loving relationship that, while still encompassing the sexual, is much, much more than that) by which Paul says the world will see Christ and come to understand His love for them. (see Ephesians 5 & John 17) 

            Well, I guess I was mistaken… I did dwell a bit on this subject but now I will move on to the final subject…

 (to be continued)

PART ONE
HERE

PART TWO
HERE

PART THREE 
HERE

PART FOUR
HERE

---

[1] For those who might wish to read more on the subject of how a holy eros may enhance the marital relationship I recommend the following books: ‘Intended for Pleasure: Sex Technique and Sexual Fulfillment in Christian Marriage’ by Dr. Ed and Gaye Wheat; ‘The Act of Marriage: The Beauty of Sexual Love’ by Dr. Tim and Beverly LaHaye; and ‘The Gift of Sex: A Christian Guide to Sexual Fulfillment’ by Clifford and Joce Penner’. Dr. LaHaye also has dedicated a web site to this subject: www.theactofmarriage.com .