Love can be taken for granted over time, and when taken for granted, it can be expected. Those who then expect love, if it is not offered to them, will generally stop offering it themselves to the one who once offered it to them.
Love rarely dies a quick death my friends, it bleeds out slowly, over time and will eventually completely dissolve, fade away, and that love can never be rekindled as it once was.
“If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.” (Heb. 6:6)
These people this verse speaks of knew love, but had not been born-again, in an analogy I am sure many of you can understand, infatuation was the termination point of their love, it never grew to a point of continual offering when the feeling of love left them.
The love of the marriage ceremony dissipated after the divorce papers are signed.
The everlasting love of those who are hid in Christ is not reliant on our part by our emotions at any given time, it is the love of the Father for the Son that this love for us rests upon, and that foundation cannot be dissolved by any action, word or deed, by any emotional state that we may find ourselves in at any given season of our life.
That love for us is constant and eternal.
But that is extremely difficult for us to comprehend, for we have never been loved by anyone in this life like that, nor have we ever been able to offer that form of love to anyone.
“If ye love me, keep my commandments.” (John 14:15)
There is no emotion of the heart in that verse, there is purposeful action inferred, it does not say, or even attempt to infer any emotion of the heart, how you feel when you obey is immaterial. And so, over time for some, His love is taken for granted, and many stop obeying because of love, and simply do so because they have been commanded to obey.
This starts to happen when the initial infatuation begins to fade away, when the excitement begins to wane, when the actions performed are done because we have been commanded, when the heart loses the feeling.
Most marriages when the love does not grow do not end in divorce, nothing more than a piece of paper and long ago vows no longer believed are all that hold them together.
“And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” (John 10:28)
That is love. That is love that fully understands our human nature and the battle we fight against it every day, that is love that sees the sincerity of our heart, that does not condemn us as our heart does. That is love that chastises because of love, that is sometimes so gentle and sweet that we feel our heart will explode, love that will never end.
We love the Lord our God as best as we can, both in an emotional context and with the actions we perform for His glory, we do not seek one more than the other. When He places us in that dry and thirsty land, we do not stop loving Him, when He chastises us, our love does not wane, it remains sincere.
“For man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.” (1st Sam. 16:7b)
Emotions of love and actions of love, the two cannot be separated.
Never, not for one moment, never take His love for you for granted, He went to the cross because of His love for you, obeying the Father in all of His actions because of His love for Him.
