How 2 Have A Healthy Relationship
I MUST begin with the foundation of my life.
“But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because He is kind to ungrateful and evil people.” Luke 6:35
If this is the posture of our hearts and our responsibility to humanity and the command from the LORD, which we must take with those who desire our death…how should we interact with those who never want us to die? I hope the soberness of that thought chills you like a frosty Autumn morning. If you don’t understand that, it’s only because you don’t want to. May your conscience sting you, until you desire to know. Next, I will attempt to persuade the heart through practical advice.
I start with a quote that will set the atmosphere of expectation:
Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You cannot make it the basis of a whole life. It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all. Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last but feelings come and go. And in fact, whatever people say, the state called ‘being in love’ usually does not last. If the old fairy-tale ending ‘They lived happily ever after’ is taken to mean ‘They felt for the next fifty years exactly as they felt the day before they were married,’ then it says what probably never was nor ever would be true, and would be highly undesirable if it were. Who could bear to live in that excitement for even five years? What would become of your work, your appetite, your sleep, your friendships? But, of course, ceasing to be ‘in love’ need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense — love as distinct from ‘being in love’ — is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God. ‘Being in love’ first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise. It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it.
Engaging in a healthy relationship requires a deeper understanding of the other person’s mechanics than your own. I am not advocating that you know this person better than yourself. For true love improves self, for the sake of the Loved. What I am advocating is that you learn that person’s language. I am not referring to their love language. By language I mean, their colloquialisms and vernacular amid the various emotions humans display over a day. Similar experiences don’t equate to similar meanings. We all display emotions in unique ways. Isn’t the LORD, the God of diversity? You must allow your understanding to inform how you respond. You must add this particular knowledge to your love. Love is intelligent.
The greatest love, The LORD’s love, couldn’t be understood if it wasn’t communicated simply and with a sureness of touch. Haven’t you read that on the day of Pentecost all the men astonishingly claimed, “We hear the Gospel in our own language!” (Acts 2:8). How many people reject Him because they just don’t understand? Follow the Lord’s example and speak coherently.
Devote yourself to learning your Beloved’s language. Again, I am not referring to the shallow love language which constricts our humanity, rather learn their definition of love. When he says I love you, what does he mean? When he says he needs space, what does that mean? Don’t force him to speak your language, would you stoop to the level of our fiendish colonizers? Are you a smaller version of America or an island formed from an unknown volcano in the purest water? Maybe even the same waters Jesus was baptized in. Can you humble yourself for the sake of your Beloved? Will you? To go another day with the same heart’s posture reveals that it’s not that you can’t, but that you won’t. And then, we will need to have another conversation because loving in this way is reserved for people who think like adults.
“Love is never wasted, for its value does not rest upon reciprocity.”
