POWERFUL CHRISTIAN LOVE jOURNEY
An Affirmation Prayer Of Love
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for what I’ve learned from the 7 Day POWERFUL CHRISTIAN LOVE JOURNEY this far. It is of great comfort to me that Your plans for me are “plans to prosper me and not to harm me, plans to give me hope and a future” (Jer. 29:11). Thank you that I am part of your family, and you are re-parenting me in very good ways, especially, where my parents and family have failed me. Hence, when I am faithless You remain faithful (2 Tim. 2:11). Therefore, nothing can separate me from Your love (Rom. 8:39). Thank You, Father, in Jesus’ loving and merciful name. Amen.
Two More Languages of Love
Yesterday, in our love devotional using the POWERFUL CHRISTIAN LOVE JOURNEY blog you learned about two kinds of love: Phileo (the affectionate love of friendship) and storge (familial love). In today’s, devotional we’ll learn about epithumia and eros. In our western society, they are celebrated because they invoke deep physical and emotional feelings. Christianity reserves them for love relationships in marriage.
EPITHUMIA—Lust or A Strong Desire
Today in our POWERFUL CHRISTIAN LOVE JOURNEY we will explore lust, strong desire, and erotic love. Actually, the Bible never refers to epithumia as love. It is positively used to describe a very important aspect of the love relationship between a husband and wife. Epithumia means to set the heart on something; long for, rightfully or otherwise. Also, it can mean to covet. A person can have a strong desire or set their heart on many things, a spouse, a new house, a car, more money or a career change. Therefore, in the Bible, it is translated negatively as lust. Likewise, it is translated as a strong desire when used positively in marriage.
EROS—Physical-Sexual Love
Due to its bad connotations, the common Greek family of words from which the English language derives the word erotic is not even used in the New Testament. In pagan society, it was described as lust, evil sexual desires, and sex outside of marriage.
Above all, this eros-love, more than the other loves, carries with it the idea of romance and beauty. Eros is a romantic, passionate and sentimental love, and it is the subject of songs and poetry. It is often the starting point for a romance between two lovers, and is completely emotional, and cannot be summoned at will.
Throughout history Eros-love has been called a rapture, exquisite pleasure, strong, sweet, and terrifying because it is so all-absorbing. It is always driven to fulfill its own needs and pleasures. Thus, it is characterized by a driving and urgent need to conquer and exclusively own the object of its desire.
EROS becomes unhealthy when a person reduces the beloved to a thing or object to be used—objectification.
This love is exclusive for only the beautiful and handsome. It desires to possess the person who exudes the highest standard of attractiveness and is clearly incapable of loving the ugly and is repulsed by a lower standard.
Similarly, it is a human love that says, “I love you because you are gorgeous and you have earned it.” Therefore, the beloved must continue to earn that love by maintaining the standard of loveliness that attracted the eros-love in the first place. Certainly, this is a very shaky foundation because it is built on weakness and will fade with the loss of beauty.
Consequently, there will always be someone more attractive than the object being loved. Often eros-love will become distracted and fall away when someone more beautiful arrives on the scene. Hence, the common experience or phrase of “falling in and out of love”.
This could account for THE SAME, APPROXIMATELY 50%,
secular and Christian divorce rateS in America
Eros Love Flourishes in Marriage
However, there is one valid place in the Christian life for this eros-love of physical attraction. When it is between a married couple (see Song of Solomon). Eros includes the idea of a strong desire to unite with and possess the beloved, which is a positive aspect of sexual union and is essential for creating oneness between a husband and wife.
Eros-love in Christian marriage carries the theme of Proverbs 5: stay away from the adulteress and always be madly in love with your wife. Eros-love
In the context of Christian marriage, it is essential eros-love be accompanied by all the loves. It can be objectifying and fickle. Eros-love will not last a lifetime by itself.
our POWERFUL CHRISTIAN LOVE JOURNEY
God Always Redeems Our Stories
My (Bill) second marriage started out completely different from the first. Actually, we had met twenty years before. It was a relationship that soaked in the love of Christ as we spent four years together in a home fellowship that I shepherded.
We were both single parents who had physical custody of our children. We spent our vacations together at family camps with our church. While our children played, we prayed for reconciliation with our spouses who had left us at about the same time. I developed a strong Phileo affection for her. She was becoming more than a sister in Christ, she was a close confidant and a treasured friend.
Then she moved to Colorado and we lost contact for about thirteen years. Our daughters became young women and met at a mutual friend’s wedding asking each other how we were doing. They exchanged phone numbers and Janean called me the next time she was teaching a single parent seminar at our former church in Southern California.
Certainly, I attended the seminar to support her. We felt that we had never been apart. Instantly, she moved back into my heart and life. We were so comfortable with one another that we could talk about anything. Furthermore, I even gave her dating advice and counseled her through some of her heartaches.
our paths of brokenness
brought us to a similar place of understanding about
God’s life-changing unconditional love and grace
A Divine Appointment Led To ALL 5 Loves And Marriage
Because of our spiritual connectedness, we decided to partner in ministry together. I subconsciously used marriage terminology as I wrote the words the two ministries have “become one” in our grant proposals, but of course, she was quite aware of it!
Even more, we were spiritually compatible. Together we had a history. I desired to spend more and more time with her. She was beautiful, romantic, affectionate, and loving. How could I resist such a completely desirable woman? Our love had blossomed:
- from a comfortable family, storge-love,
- leading to an affectionate friendship, phileo-love,
- to a strong epithumia-desire to be with her,
- progressing to a passionate, physical desire to have and to hold her in eros-love,
- to an unconditional/spiritual, agape-love that longed to be one flesh with her in Holy Matrimony.
The Lord had placed His love in me,
which I wanted to pour out into Janean as my wife.
Try Journaling the Following Questions
- Lord, do I love my spouse will all 5-kinds of love?
- Is it Your will to change how I love my spouse?
- Show me how to specifically express a particular kind of love to my spouse that I need to develop?
Intimacy with god and spouse valentine special
A “Four-course Online Valentine Bundle” with hundreds of Christian intimacy experiences, disciplines, and lessons to ignite prayer, connectedness, intimacy, & romance with Spouse and God. You will experience God and your Spouse like never before!
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body (marriage and intimacy); and be thankful.” (Col. 3:15).
Click Here to learn more!!!
https://www.christianintimacyexperts.com/spiritual/naked-unashamed/
CLICK HERE TO READ DAY 6
https://www.christianintimacyexperts.com/a-powerful-heartfelt-christian-love-devotion-day-six/