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What It's Not

             Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. (I Corinthians 13:4-5)

Ah, love, as I said yesterday, not a definition, but a description, and at least in today’s description, it’s mostly about what love doesn’t do. It begins with being patient, which for some of us is a negative word. It means that it doesn’t give up on its object, but gives its object time to do whatever the lover wants. There are times in disagreements with others when they say they’re done or that they won't answer my question. They are taking command and ending the discussion because I’m not worth their effort, and they’ve run out of patience. Sometimes, that’s the answer I get as soon as I disagree with them. Since I wasn’t seeking their love, that’s OK. It just occurred to me that this is what’s going on.

The second item is entirely positive. Love is kind. It lends its strength.

But from there, it’s clearly and entirely negative. Love does not…

Envy. Jealousy often means we want what someone else has. Envy means we resent, condemn, or hate the one(s) who have it. It should go without saying that we cannot love someone while resenting, condemning, or hating him/her. Admittedly, we can envy those who claim to love, and we can ricochet back and forth between some form of love and envy. And while the love may “soften the envy,” envy will destroy the love.

Boast. This involves not only thinking we are worthy and important, but also effectively forcing others to agree, or to earn our anger by disagreeing. In some ways, it is an attempt to generate admiration and/or envy in others toward ourselves. It does not emerge from our love (even of ourselves) but from a desire to be worshipped. It can be either positive (“Look how great I am!”) or negative (Look what a pathetic, miserable, worthless thing I am. Now go ahead and prove me wrong.”)

Be Proud. This is the attitude that produces envy, boasting, dishonoring others, and self-seeking.

Dishonor Others. This is our response when we envy or are proud and are not rewarded as we want to be. We attack them.

Self-Seek. Now this one is bringing about an interesting and convicting thought. Generally, we might tend to think of this as trying to get our own way, trying to get benefits for ourselves (deserved or otherwise). But I’m writing a story with identity as a theme, and my character is going to try to figure out who or what she is. We don’t hear it quite as often today, but at one point, people talked about going to “find themselves.” What she and we end up doing is focusing on ourselves to the exclusion of others.

The key to all of these is that when our focus is on ourselves, it’s not loving, even of ourselves.

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