This Valentine’s Day don’t Believe the Love Lie

Ok, folks. Let’s recap. This past week, we compared “love lies” (human perspective) to “love truths” (God’s perspective). To be clear, I’m definitely not “anti-marriage” – just hope for people to find contentment at whatever state they might find themselves in at any given time in life – and more than that, purpose and joy! You will not leave this world married, so critical to know who you are and who (or what) you choose to invest in.

For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible,
whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
Col. 1:16

“You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things,
and by your will they were created and have their being.”
Rev 4:11

He created them male and female and blessed them.
And he named them “Mankind” when they were created.
Genesis 5:2

Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies.
He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.
Eph. 5:21-33 (the WHOLE thing!)

Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others,
as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.
1 Peter 4:10

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and
with all your mind; and, Love your neighbor as yourself.
Luke 10:27

“The heart is more deceitful than anything. It is incurable— who can know it?”
Jer. 17:9

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”
Proverbs 4:23.

If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.
1 John 3:20

But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back.
Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High,
because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.
Luke 6:35

And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Mark 12:30-31

By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.
But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
1 John 3: 16-18

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast;
it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way;
it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
1 Corinthians 13: 4-7