We Stretch Ourselves for Those Persons Whom We Love

We Stretch Ourselves for Those Persons Whom We Love

Most persons have one or two primary love languages out of which they operate.  Theorists posit five distinct love languages: (1) spending time together, (2) verbal affirmation, (3) duty, (4) gifts and (5) physical touch.  Usually, a person determines his two strengths and functions in automatic pilot.  It is easy to settle into a routine in life.  He may say to himself, “This is the way that I am.  This is who I am.  My beloved should simply accept me for who I am.  She should receive the love that I have to give.”  However, I counter that we stretch ourselves for those persons whom we love.  We adjust our desires and behavior to meet the needs of spouses and significant others.  We willingly pursue personal growth and spiritual development to enable us to love them in the most affirming ways.  We resist the tendency to say, “Here, take the love that I am giving and be grateful.”  Instead, we adapt and learn their love languages.

Do most people bother stop and embrace the spiritual discipline of self-evaluation, particularly as it relates to loving other people?  Do we examine any shortcomings of our personalities that adversely affect the persons whom we love?  Do we challenge ourselves to grow by eliminating these character deficits?  Do we fall for the temptation of making daily excuses for our inadequacies by comparing them with those of our spouses?  Since she has faults, I am entitled to mine.  More basically, do we settle for that trifling stance of saying, “This is just the way that I am.  I was brought up this way and I cannot change.”

I suggest that each of us should resolve to stretch ourselves as we love others.  Yes, many of us did not grow up in families where people were verbally affirming and demonstratively, physically affectionate by greeting each other with hugs and kisses.  Some of us were not the recipients of perennial and seasonal gifts on the occasion of birthdays, graduations, holidays, etc.  Others of us could not rely upon our parents and older siblings for the completion of regular chores such as the laundry, grocery shopping, clothes, and other necessities.  The consequence of those disappointments is our difficulty on doing these things for others, as they were not done for us.  On the contrary, I believe that we can learn to do these activities and a whole lot more for those persons whom we love.

“Where there is love, there is no burden.”  In order to love genuinely, we willingly learn other love languages so that our spouses and families can receive our heartfelt affection for them.  Actually, love is the primary motivation for challenging ourselves to leave our comfort zones and move beyond our ingrained personalities.  Rarely would we do this for colleagues and acquaintances.  Understandably, we reserve this personal growth goal for our most meaningful relationships.  Love yields the heartfelt willingness to modify the way we love others so that they may receive what we offer and who we are.  Love does not create a burden.  Rather, it is a privilege to demonstrate to someone else the height, depth width and breath of one’s genuine feelings.

Our Heavenly Father graciously and mercifully assumed the burden of love by sending His “One and Only Begotten Son” into the world to prove His love for humankind.  Initially, God’s love insisted upon our perfect obedience to His laws and strict adherence to His holy character.  It soon became most obvious that His requirements were burdensome to our human forebears.  The infidelity in the Garden of Eden showed humankind’s inability to faithfully love the Lord according to those conditions.  Then, God gave us the Law as a guide for loving Him.  As we followed His commands, we exhibited our love for Him.  Not surprisingly, God saw that following His Law was not a love language that we understood.  In response, God sent His holy prophets to preach about His unfailing love; the Hebrew word is hesed.  Unfortunately, their proclamations did not persuade the people of God to learn His love language.  Consequently, in the fullness of time, God, out of His love for the world, sent His Son to save the world and not condemn it.  In the inimitable gift of Christ, God encapsulates all five of the love languages.  Thereby, He stretches Himself toward us so that we in turn may learn the love language of agape, the most giving and sacrificial love.  The apostle tells the Church at Rome, “God demonstrates His love for us in this; that while we were yet sinners, He sent Christ to die for us.” 

We stretch ourselves for those persons whom we love.  We renounce the idea that insist a person only values a relationship if he unconditionally accepts the love that his spouse gives.  Admittedly, many persons are so grateful to be loved that they uncritically take any love given to them.  In time, as they gain a greater sense of self, they determine that they need more and they demand it from their spouses.  These new demands emerge as a shock and a challenge.  Nevertheless, love encourages their spouses to learn a new love language in order to love their mates in the most affirming way.  A significant aspect of loving a mate is helping him or her become the very best child of God of which he or she is capable.  That may mean stretching one’s self.