Love is not a feeling. It is an attitude that we choose to adopt and which asks big sacrifices of us. Without love, we become selfish and hard. And that is not very attractive!

Love is not natural. Our flesh only wants to meet our own needs or protect our achievements. Also, we are naturally lazy, we prefer to take the easy way. Getting motivated to work hard or to pursue a project, our body can require the help of a hormone, endorphin. Love demands that we sacrifice our “self” for the well-being of someone else, which is not natural for us.

What is love? Of course, the text that best describes it is 1 Corinthians 13. “Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (v.4-7 NASB).

Love is not a feeling or a passing emotion. The small butterflies we feel when we meet an attractive person is a feeling of desire, and this feeling is often related to what we personally can get from it. “The way this man looks at me makes me feel desirable; hearing this woman talk continually fills the silence of my life…” But these feelings always fade with time. Some married couples talk about getting a divorce because they “do not love each other anymore”. In fact, they do not lack love, it is rather that they do not feel their needs are met.

In private coaching, my husband and I sometimes meet women who say they have a strong temperament. They are very controlling and keep a close watch on their loved ones. They say they do it out of love, but when we really think about it, that is not loving. They are motivated by fear or resentment. Hardness is not an attractive quality, and often these controlling women have a hard time finding a partner. They are scary!

On the male side, we often see men being very possessive, even jealous, when they have a relationship with a woman. They believe that their feeling is love, but again, it’s more a mixture of fear and selfishness. They have difficulty moving forward in a relationship because their attitude is scary!

In fact, we can even serve God without love. We can be involved in several ministries because we feel useful or admired. It is good to stop at times to reflect on our motives behind our devotions. Maybe we started serving for God’s sake, but after many years in the same position, we are now doing it out of habit, without thinking. When we forget to serve for love’s sake, we become bitter, hard and impatient. Or the opposite, we become easily hurt and sensitive to the comments of others.

God is love. It is also one of the fruits of the Spirit. If you are unsure about your motivations in life, have a good time with God and let him immerse you in his love. We must not forget that we can not give what we have not received, or what we have stopped receiving! Life goes very fast, it is easy to have our mind invaded by our needs and the demands related to our occupations. We can easily lose our love. We should stop here and there to evaluate the state of our heart.

Because a person filled with the love of God, who loves himself in a healthy way and who gives himself to others in a free and balanced way, is a very attractive person. If you wonder why you are still single, pass your heart through the filter of the Holy Spirit. Do you need a new touch of his love?