What I Think The Most Famous Bible Verse About Love Is Really About…

Love is patient, love is kind.

He is patient with me, even when I want to jump a thousand places ahead. I am patient with him in the way that I would wait as long as it takes, even if I complain about it the whole time.

He is kind to me always. Nothing I say ever changes the way he speaks to me. He speaks to me gently, he speaks to me in a way that I know he knows I’ve been hurt. He knows I need to be let down easy; he knows that I need time and space to process big emotions. I am kind to him always, even when I am frustrated. It is never at him, it is at being too far away from the one I love, the one I admire, the one I adore, the one I never get tired of giving compliments because I know exactly how much love hr deserves. The one who looks past my trauma responses, and actually sees me, underneath it all…

It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.

I do not envy the one I love- I feel like they are my partner, my teammate. The one I can talk to about anything, even if the problems I’m facing are deeply personal and sometimes try to cross boundaries. He doesn’t have an envious bone in his body, and he always says to me “you’re perfect”, so I started saying it back to him, because I know he is perfect. <3 I do not walk around telling people wildly in the streets about my love. I let it do its work inside, building me into a better person, telling me where I’m wrong, accepting my own harshest criticisms, so that I can be the best version of myself, for him. It is not proud, I am proud of HIM. I am proud of his actions, and what he has done with his life, I am not proud of loving him. To do so is narcissistic and rude. See, what the bible meant by this verse, wasn’t talking about literal meanings. I see what the Bible means now. It doesn’t mean to say that we have to have this idealistic love; it just means that we have to actually love people for WHO they are. We cannot use people’s hearts, we cannot hurt them like that. We must realize, that love is about what you experience, what you see. Love is what you DO. Love is not what you feel. It is also what you DO. If you really, love someone, you will treat them fairly. You will be patient with them, you will be kind. But no where in the Bible did it say you had to be perfect and free from sin. Because, you see, the other person, accepts you, for who you are, even with your flaws. You are called to do the same. Someone loved Jesus even more than anyone could even know. Someone loved him so much, understood how important he was to humanity at the time, that they let him go. He chose to spread his love to everyone instead of one person. She washed his feet. She kissed him one last time. She forgave him, because she loved him and the sacrifices he made. That is the kind of love Jesus wants us to have. That is the kind of love that moves mountains and changes the world. That is the kind of love, that actually DOES something beautiful and big. But it doesn’t have to. Love can be simple and sweet. Love can be anything. It is so often described as a feeling, when it’s really a realization.

It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered.

Real love challenges you; real love will ask you to kill your ego. Real love will kick you in the pants and say “if you really love them, you have to let them be and find their owin way”. Real love is REALIZING if you are doing these things, admitting the truth, and coming to peace with yourself. He does not dishonor me because he loves me, he is not self-seeking, he cares about me and my feelings, because he loves me. He is not easily angered with me, because he knows what I’ve been through, and he understands my pain, and he knows that I don’t mean to do things to hurt anyone. He could never make me angry, I could never dishonor him, I only care about his happiness. I care about his happiness over my own.

It keeps no record of wrongs;

No matter how many times we may slip up or fall back into old ways, it will never matter. We will always stand through these hardships with love and faith and strength in God. Love is divinely matched, perfectly timed, even when it feels like it’s not. I could never hold grudges against the man I love. He could never minimize me to my actions, no matter how unintentionally hurtful. For each other, we do not apply the same rules. The callous and cold ways that other people treat one another (“an eye for an eye”), do not apply to us. We could never. Because we love each other, so, so much.

Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth.

Sin, lust, greed, anger, none of these things will ever impact their love. It is imppossible to tempt either of them away from loving each other. It feels like the entire world might be trying to pull them apart, but they see each other, and each other’s truths, and they rejoice, they are happy, they are finally glad to see that they were never alone in the first place. That God had waited this exact moment to show them that they were meant for each other. And that no matter what happened, they would always love each other.

It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

She wanted to protect him from all of the people that had been and still were hurting him. She wanted so badly to protect him with all the love she could muster from her brave little heart. She wanted to surround him in a loving energy. They trust one another. They trust one another so much, that even if they have a moment of weakness, even if they tell each other a simple lie just to make a day easier, or just because they are scared, or whatever the reason may be, they will still love each other. They still trust each other. Because they know, and God knows, their love is divine. It is controlled by the heavens, not anything that could tear them apart on this Earth. They see each other and know that they are human, that they are sinners, but they love each other anyway. They always hope for the greatest experiences and the greatest adventures and the greatest moments they will spend with that one person, loving them in this timeless way over and over and over again. Most importantly, it doesn’t matter what happens in this dimension, or this timeline, or this earth even. They both know the answer; they both know that love always perseveres, so they never have to be worried about losing each other. They know they will both stay loyal to each other forever.

Love never fails.

Wheneever there is a trial in life to be faced, whenever something bad happens, whenever life seems to give you more pain and strife than you ever feel like you deserve, you persevere through that, you are resilient. You understand that fundamentally, the first place love has to come from, is you, and if you haven’t been taught properly how to love, because you grew up in a toxic house, you realize, that they real reason you are here, is because love never fails. Because you are capable of learning to love yourself. You are capable of making your dreams come true. You don’t need someone else to prove that. You don’t need to prove anything to anyone because love is always here, in your heart, and it will never abandon you, just like God will never turn his back on you.

But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.

God is warning us, that is we try to force things too much, in this world. If we try to seek love in unpure ways, we will not receive it. That you will only be able to feel real love, timeless love, the love you’ve always been searching for, if you look within yourself. If you understand that you don’t need someone else to fix you (prophecies). Gossip is ugly. Knowledge falls away from those who choose to be blind to the truth.

The most important thing, I’ve learned about love, is that, love is seeing the TRUTH. Love is accepting the TRUTH. Love is being okay with where you are, because you understand why you are here. Love is comforting yourself, reparenting yourself. Showing yourself that you are capable. Love is taking the time to be patient with YOURSELF. Love is never passing YOURSELF by. Love is first built from within in, and God wants us to know, there is no other way around it. God wants us to know, it is not selfish to love ourselves. In loving who we are, we gain the personal power we need, to fight all obstacles, all battles of life. Some of us have harder battles to fight than others, but God is always with us, God will never abandon us.

God loves us the way we need to be loved. He loves us unconditionally, and he asks us to love ourselves the same way. When we are asking for our sins to be forgiven in church, it’s not because we are bad people or we have been “bad”. It is because God knows the only way to truly heal, and learn to love yourself, is by looking within. By teaching yourself, by loving YOURSELF first.