Love Is...

After thinking a lot about what it means to be committed in a relationship, I realized that my ideas can be stated simply with the words, Faith, Hope and Love. My profile points out that these are the most powerful forces on earth, even greater than money or power, and I want to show you why in this note. Perhaps it is an overstatement, but many men and women seem to become more commitment-phobic the older they get. Thinking through it helps you pinpoint what makes commitment most difficult for you.

First, consider the word HOPE. I'm not talking about the English definition of the word, but a more meaningful idea that looks more like a soccer goal or homeplate in baseball than a subjective feeling. And it isn't just any goal you choose, but rather its THE hope you hold out for your friendship, which is the hope of always being a benefit to your relationship partner. Can you promise to only do good to that person, and never evil? Even if you have to part ways, you can part knowing that your thoughts and speech about each other will always be gracious. This is your hope for the relationship. It may seem like a unobtainable dream, but it is up to you to make it a reality. The peace this promise can create in a relationship is astounding, and worthy of consideration.

The second facet to committing to a relationship is to have FAITH in the hope you have between you. You have to believe the person extends the same hope to you. Can you expect your relationship partner to promise the same thing you have, that is to only benefit each other? This is definitive trust, and in return you have to be trustworthy, as well. Certainly this is the most difficult part of a relationship for some of us. People have a tendency to hurt and betray each other, so we become less trustful and thereby less trustworthy. If you make the commitment to trust your relationship partner, it can keep you focused when it is not clear what you should do in a given situation. Your heart can then consider what is wise, which is not really possible when fear or jealousy skew your thinking. It is always best to know yourself well enough to know what clouds your thinking in many situations.

The greatest part of a commitment to love someone is the LOVE part. It's not emotion based, but another, different promise to accept someone as they are. Genuine love for a friend does not require that person to change in order to obtain your generosity and peace. This part of the commitment is a balance to people's inevitable untrustworthiness, and this type of love is agape. The cost of agape love is self-sacrifice. There are not immediate warm fuzzies to making sacrifices for others, but it does reap physiological benefits which you have to experience to understand.

These are not the only types of love you can experience in a committed relationship. Some types of love are contingent on certain behaviors. Such as PHILEO, which is dependent on a feeling of unity with another person, and this can only be obtained through a little communication and relating to each other. Another type is EROS, which is sexual love. Pure eros is dependent on fidelity, otherwise a chemical reaction of this sort of attraction is only biological, which isn't the same as eros in the spiritual sense. Unlike agape, both of these types of love require interaction with each other.

Human tendency is to make a committed relationship a standard for everyone, but that wouldn't be biblically or psychologically wise. It is up to each person to determine if another person is capable of a commitment like this, and to draw appropriate boundaries for themselves. These are just principle guidelines, but the practical application of it is something that has to be considered carefully and determined individually. The power of these three dispositions in your life and in the world to affect change is immeasurable. If every person made this sort of commitment to one other person in their life, it could change the whole dynamic of a society, and without a doubt it would change history.

I mention in my profile that I am a follower of Jesus Christ, and that I believe he is the greatest story of compassion that has ever been told, if you understand the story thoroughly. Compassion is part of the hope you have established between you and your relationship partner. It is difficult to trust people for compassion once you have been hurt a few times. Trusting Jesus can be an effective path to the ability to trust another person, and it gives you a safety net when others are not trustworthy. No matter what humans may do, Jesus Christ can always be trusted to protect you from the worst of things. Grasping this type of peace with Christ is an extremely powerful tool to use in your most intimate relationships.