True Love
“Love—The more one reads 1 Corinthians 13, the more one has to face the fact that we don’t naturally have that kind of love in us. The only way to get it is to get it from God.” (Foundation Study Bible, 1 Corinthians 13:1-13)
“Truly profound, sincere, and unified Christian religiosity will not be reborn so easily or quickly only because of confusion or fear. It will only be reborn from sincere sorrow at being estranged from God's bosom, only through love that is renewed through contemplation and wisdom. Seemingly, half the known world suffers from "enlightened atheism," and so it doesn't seek that love, nor does it even know how to seek it.” (Ivan Ilyin)
“I understand your suffering, or so I think, because I’ve compared it to mine. But I’ll tell you another secret, my friend. This is not true compassion. This is empathy. An emotion which, although very good, comes tainted by all the usual human self-trickery. I believe I care for you when really it is myself I care for most. The proof of this falseness is how soon we weary of empathy when we are required to have it for someone too long. Our stores are limited. Quickly used up.” (Cheryl Anne Tuggle)
“Love for Christ is unlike anything else. It doesn’t end, you can’t have enough of. It transmits life, gives strength, grants health, it keeps giving…and the more it gives, the more one wishes to fall in love. Whilst human love may wear one out, drive him crazy. When we love Christ, all other loves recede. Other loves have a saturation point…Love for Christ doesn’t have one.” (St. Porphyrios the Kapsokalivite)
“…love for a Christian is not a feeling. Love for a Christian means the works of love.” (Peter Kreeft)
“Monotony and misery cannot exist where there is love. But the fire of love must be kept burning warmly & brightly with the sweet wood of sacrifice. In teaching us to cross the “I” out of life, our Lord tells us the secret of happiness; what the Saints call the ecstasy of self-forgetfulness. For divine love is always self-effacing, seeks to give rather than to receive, to serve rather than be served, to love rather than to be loved, and will sacrifice anything for the beloved. Only then does love become a clean and holy fire in the heart, and not an ugly flare of lust.” (St. Seraphim of Sarov)
“Do this in remembrance of Me” means not only to “eat this bread and drink this cup” to “proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes,” not only to “keep it as a feast by an everlasting ordinance”; it means also, “Love one another as I have loved you. If we do not have Christ’s love in our hearts; if we put ourselves first and not last; if we wish to be served rather than to serve, we betray the very meaning of the Lord’s Supper.” (Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou)
“True love willingly bears privations, troubles and labors; endures offences, humiliations, defects, sins, and injustices, if they do not harm others; bears patiently and meekly with the baseness and malice of others, leaving judgment to the all-seeing God, the righteous Judge, and praying that He may teach those who are darkened by senseless passions.” (St. John of Kronstadt)
“Every personal relationship requires us to consider the other’s needs, problems, moods, and concerns. If we are to love, we must to step outside of ourselves and enter into the lives of others. We deliberately seek ways to offer service to them. This movement away from self and toward the other reflects our commitment to loving like Christ.” (Dynamis 8/27/2018)
“Love is not merely emotional, it is sacrificial. Love without sacrifice is often nothing more than strong sentiment.” (Sacramental Living)