What Is Your Motivation to Love? - Larry Ollison

What Is Your Motivation to Love?

Years ago, there was a song that talked about how people look for love in all the wrong places. Actually, some look for love for all the wrong reasons. One lady who was in a marriage that was falling apart because her husband was abusive, told me that the only reason she fell in love with her husband was because she was on the "rebound." Getting married on the rebound is a direct result of fear. We should never attempt to love because of fear. Love should be based on faith.



Over the years, I've met many couples that were brought together for the wrong reasons. Depression, jealousy, and manipulation are all grounded in fear and based on control.



Colossians 3:19 says, "Husbands love your wives and do not be bitter toward them." Titus 2:4 says that young women are to love their husbands and to love their children. Hebrews 10:24 says that we should consider one another in order to stir up love and good works. Yes, we must love, but we must love in faith and not by the spirit of fear.



Faith is associated with love in the same way that fear is associated with hate. What love is described as being in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, so is faith. Faith is kind and does not envy. Faith does not parade itself. Faith is not puffed up and is not rude. Faith is not self-serving and is not easily provoked. Faith does not dwell on evil and does not rejoice in someone else's failure. Faith believes and hopes and endures. Faith never fails.



The opposite of faith is fear. Fear is not patient and is unkind. Fear walks in envy and parades itself. Fear is rude, self-seeking, and easily provoked. Fear is evil and rejoices in sin and despises the truth. Fear does not believe, has no hope, and will never endure. Fear always fails.



So what is your motivation to love? Is it based on faith or is it founded in fear? True love and faith are eternal and nothing can overpower them.