Discussion: Love

OK, now I remember that I said that God speaks to me in modules and every week, whatever the sermon topic was on, so will what I have to deal with that week. So when this week's sermon was on Song of Songs, on love and relationship, I was really asking God "now what do you have in stalled for me." Anyway, I began to come to realization what God was trying to teach me this week, something on relationship. As I was thinking about how to cover the CG discussion today, I came across a little wooden tag that was given to me as a gift and on it, it said from Ephesians 5:1-2 that:

1. Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children 2. and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

This very much sums up about love... God Himself love us so much He became flesh and died for our sins; his unfailing and faithful love is so wonderful and we are always reminded to love God with all our heart, our soul and our might and to love His people as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-40), that being the greatest commandment. The music worship was great yesterday as we sang of God's love for us and so was ice-breaker as we penned down words of encouragement, affirmation and poem for one other person:

New Every Morning

Lord Your love is higher than the mountains

Lord Your love is deeper than the sea

Lord Your love is wider than the ocean

It's a steadfast love You have given me

Your love is new every morning

New every morning

Like the sun that rises from the east

Your love is new every morning

New every morning

I am grateful for Your love to me

It's Your grace that I can now draw nearer

It's Your blood that cleanses me from sin

It's Your peace that my heart rejoices within

It's Your love, a love no one could give

I Could Sing of Your Love Forever
Over the mountains and the sea
Your river runs with love for me
And I will open up my heart
And let the healer set me free

I'm happy to be in the truth
And I will daily lift my hands
For I will always sing
Of when Your love came down

I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever

Oh I feel like dancing
It's foolishness I know
But when the world has seen the light
They will dance with joy like we're dancing now

For any relationship, love should be at the centre of it all. But how do we express that love? Anyway, here are the questions we used for the 5 Love Languages test we did yesterday and, in my opinion, our love language change with our life experiences and determines how we feel loved by others as well as express our love to others. So, it would be good to come back once in a while to understand our love language and also our loved ones' love language:

Click on the image for a larger version
Source: Virtuous Woman magazine (2005 Spring issue)

Gary Chapman, who wrote the book "Five Love Languages" briefly describes the different languages on his website as follows:

Words of Affirmation
Mark Twain once said “I can live for two months on a good compliment.” Verbal appreciation speaks powerfully to persons whose primary Love Language is “Words of Affirmation.” Simple statements, such as, “You look great in that suit,” or “You must be the best baker in the world! I love your oatmeal cookies,” are sometimes all a person needs to hear to feel loved.

Aside from verbal compliments, another way to communicate through “Words of Affirmation” is to offer encouragement. Here are some examples: reinforcing a difficult decision; calling attention to progress made on a current project; acknowledging a person’s unique perspective on an important topic. If a loved one listens for “Words of Affirmation,” offering encouragement will help him or her to overcome insecurities and develop greater confidence.

Quality Time
Quality time is more than mere proximity. It’s about focusing all your energy on your mate. A husband watching sports while talking to his wife is NOT quality time. Unless all of your attention is focused on your mate, even an intimate dinner for two can come and go without a minute of quality time being shared.

Quality conversation is very important in a healthy relationship. It involves sharing experiences, thoughts, feelings and desires in a friendly, uninterrupted context. A good mate will not only listen, but offer advice and respond to assure their mate they are truly listening. Many mates don’t expect you to solve their problems. They need a sympathetic listener.

An important aspect of quality conversation is self-revelation. In order for you to communicate with your mate, you must also be in tune with your inner emotions. It is only when you understand your emotions and inner feelings will you then be able to share quality conversation, and quality time with your mate.

Quality activities are a very important part of quality time. Many mates feel most loved when they spend physical time together, doing activities that they love to do. Spending time together will bring a couple closer, and, in the years to come, will fill up a memory bank that you can reminisce about in the future. Whether it’s sitting on the couch and having a brief conversation or playing together in a tennis league, quality time is a love language that is shared by many. Setting aside focused time with your mate will ensure a happy marriage.

Receiving Gifts
Some mates respond well to visual symbols of love. If you speak this love language, you are more likely to treasure any gift as an expression of love and devotion. People who speak this love language often feel that a lack of gifts represents a lack of love from their mate. Luckily, this love language is one of the easiest to learn.

If you want to become an effective gift giver, many mates will have to learn to change their attitude about money. If you are naturally a spender, you will have no trouble buying gifts for your mate. However, a person who is used to investing and saving their money may have a tough time adjusting to the concept of spending money as an expression of love. These people must understand that you are investing the money not in gifts, but in deepening your relationship with your mate.

The gift of self is an important symbol of love. Sometimes all your mate desires is for someone to be there for them, going through the same trials and experiencing the same things. Your body can become a very powerful physical symbol of love.

These gifts need not to come every day, or even every week. They don’t even need to cost a lot of money. Free, frequent, expensive, or rare, if your mate relates to the language of receiving gifts, any visible sign of your love will leave them feeling happy and secure in your relationship.

Acts of Service
Sometimes simple chores around the house can be an undeniable expression of love. Even simple things like laundry and taking out the trash require some form of planning, time, effort, and energy. Just as Jesus demonstrated when he washed the feet of his disciples, doing humble chores can be a very powerful expression of love and devotion to your mate.

Very often, both pairs in a couple will speak to the Acts of Service Language. However, it is very important to understand what acts of service your mate most appreciates. Even though couples are helping each other around the house, couples will still fight because the are unknowingly communicating with each other in two different dialects. For example, a wife may spend her day washing the cars and walking to dog, but if her husband feels that laundry and dishes are a superior necessity, he may feel unloved, despite the fact that his wife did many other chores throughout the day. It is important to learn your mate’s dialect and work hard to understand what acts of service will show your love.

It is important to do these acts of service out of love and not obligation. A mate who does chores and helps out around the house out of guilt or fear will inevitably not be speaking a language of love, but a language of resentment. It’s important to perform these acts out of the kindness of your heart.

Demonstrating the acts of service can mean stepping out of the stereotypes. Acts of service require both mates to humble themselves into doing some chores and services that aren’t usually expected from their gender. However, these little sacrifices will mean the world to your mate, and will ensure a happy relationship.

Physical Touch
Many mates feel the most loved when they receive physical contact from their partner. For a mate who speaks this love language loudly, physical touch can make or break the relationship.

Sexual intercourse makes many mates feel secure and loved in a marriage. However, it is only one dialect of physical touch. Many parts of the body are extremely sensitive to stimulation. It is important to discover how your partner not only physically responds but also psychologically responds to these touches.

It is important to learn how your mate speaks the physical touch language. Some touches are irritating and uncomfortable for your mate. Take the time to learn the touches your mate likes. They can be big acts, such as back massages or lovemaking, or little acts such as touches on the cheek or a hand on the shoulder. It’s important to learn how your mate responds to touch. That is how you will make the most of this love language.

All marriages will experience crisis. In these cases, physical touch is very important. In a crisis situation, a hug can communicate an immense amount of love for that person. A person whose primary love language is physical touch would much rather have you hold them and be silent than offer any advice.

It is important to remember that this love language is different for everyone. What type of touch makes you feel secure is not necessarily what will make your partner happy. It is important to learn each other’s dialects. That way you can make the most of your hugging, kissing, and other physical contacts.

Source: http://www.fivelovelanguages.com/learn.html

The 5 love languages help us to see how we can express love to others. But then, remembering that we are to love our neighbours as we love ourselves, how do we then develop a relationship with others? Through the discussion yesterday, we discussed a little and some speak of:

• Genuineness - I had shared yesterday how I had developed a very deep working relationship with this middle-age lady at my previous workplace. It was a wonderful working relationship though it started off rather rocky the first week, until we decided to sit down to talk about it. What happened in the end is that we agreed to be open with one another whenever we are upset with the other person. What followed was one and a half years of wonderful working relationship and she treated me like a son. In fact, the working relationship was so strong that when I was packing to go off on the last day of work, she laughed and joked that she felt I am not leaving but just going on long leave. As we pulled down the shutters for the last time together, she teared and seeing her tear made me tear too. To date, this is one of my most satisfying working relationship and it was only possible because both agreed to disagree and to sit down to talk about things whenever we are upset. We refused to let things snowball. There were of course times when still we had little conflicts but then we too took courage to apologise to one another when we felt something was wrong because we cherished the working relationship. Frankly, it was only her and me in that workplace so can you imagine the tension if there was any conflict :)
• Tough love - Sometimes, it is also essential to practice tough love when we see something not working right. We are reminded that tough love is still love and it should be done out of love and not out of resentment or to get back at someone. It is to help build each another up.
  
• Forgiveness - We need to sometimes also forgive people for their mistakes because if we do not, we carry with us baggages which not only will affect that relationship (because we will start to keep tabs of every wrong thing that person does against us) but also subsequently and possibly, relationship with others as well. I myself have faced this and has not learnt to let go. After a long chat with a friend yesterday at the airport, it has come to my realisation how my not letting go of a past hurt by a friend has impacted me in my relationship with others, so much so I became very introverted. I am continuing to pray for healing and will also take a step to address it at NLE.
• Acceptance - Someone shared that acceptance is also important because frankly, people can never be 100% similar. There are bound to be differences in the ways we live our lives mainly also because we all have different life experiences. It is a common analogy that people use to remind us that even on the first day of marriage, the way the husband squeezes toothpaste out might be different from that of the wife and this could even cause a conflict. Maybe, staying in focus about the love and not letting the little trivial stuff fret you maybe the key. Full acceptance and not resentful acceptance is important.

Of course, I gather there will be other ways as well so feel free to add on to the list :) The bible reminds us that we need to love others. We have talked about loving each other, but what about God? How do we develop a relationship with God? Maybe, if I can push it a little, God uses all the 5 languages...

• He speaks words of affirmation to you through people, circumstances, sermons, the bible, songs etc,
  
• He gave us the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ,
• Jesus also came to serve as a act of service,
  
• He also is willing to spend quality time with us if we would choose to spend quality time with Him and
  
• Finally, in my opinion, it is possible for Him to touch us too (though not in the conventional sense of the word) through the Holy Spirit.
  

But how are we developing our relationship with God? Feel free to contribute as well :)