The Secret To Staying In Love

Well, as you may notice, it’s been over a year since I’ve had any inspiration to write anything on this blog. It seems fitting that my first inspiration in a year would be about the “Secret” to staying in love. Well, OK, you probably realize that every preacher can’t seem to help claiming to knowing the “secret” to success in some manner. Usually we are just trying to make you think we know something you don’t. In reality, most times you do know, but may need a reminder. That is most likely the case here.

If you’re a Christian you have at least heard the word disciple. Hopefully you know enough of what a disciple is supposed to be, that you strive to truly be a disciple of Christ. Something that I found a little surprising as I looked at various resources to confirm what my memory told me, was that my commentaries and my study Bibles did not show the definition of the word disciple. I had to look at “Vine’s Concise Expository Dictionary of Biblical Words” to actually find the Greek word and definition to that word. Just so you’ll be impressed; the Greek word translated disciple is the word mathetes.

Most of us tend to associate the word disciple with “discipline”, and there certainly is a need for discipline in living for Jesus. However, the word disciple doesn’t come from a Greek word meaning discipline. The Greek Word mathetes means “a learner” (Strongs 3101 should you care). I hope that as soon as you saw the meaning your mind began racing with all the ways this applies to us as “learners” of Christ.

If you are married, or ever wish to be, you have hopefully read Ephesians 5:22-33. If not, please take a moment to do so, I’ll wait right here.

OK, I will assume you have read the Scripture as of now. If you’re a husband or hope to be one, I hope you payed special attention to verses 28, 29 and 33. The primary command to a husband is to LOVE his wife. Not only to love her, but love her as Christ loved the Church. You are the bride of Christ, if indeed you are in the Church. Christ showed His love for you by giving of Himself to the point of death upon the cross to pay for your sins. That’s love my friend, giving of yourself and putting the one you love before yourself. I would like to assume that every married Christian knows that the Christian marriage is to be an example, even a “type” of the Church’s relationship with Christ (Though I want to go off on a tangent about the reality of most Christian marriages and the divorce rate, etc., I will refrain).

So what is the “secret” I know about staying in love? A pretty simple and obvious one I suppose by now. If a husband wants to stay in love with his wife, he needs to become a learner of his wife. He should strive to know her a little more every day. Hopefully, (here is where it helps for the wife to be interesting) the more you know her, the more you love her.

The correlation to our walk and love for God should be obvious. If you struggle in your relationship with Jesus, allow me to ask you; “are you a learner of Jesus”? If you will read Paul’s Epistles to the Church, you will notice that he always assumes that there is a continual desire to learn more of God. Read Colossians 1 for instance with this in mind.

What causes most marriages to grow stale? I don’t know! I’ve never been married! I would guess however, that it is much the same as our relationship with Jesus. When you grow stagnant in relationship, most start looking elsewhere to “supplement” the boredom. Which of course erodes the stagnant relationship even further.

To sum all this up: The secret to staying in love with Jesus is; to always be learning more of Jesus. Become a full-time professional student of Jesus. He never gets boring! The more you learn of Him, the more you love Him and want to learn more. I have been a Christian for 21 years and I can say that for myself, every time I grew cold in my relationship with Jesus, I had started to look elsewhere. How do you rekindle the fire of love from the ashes of stagnant love? You start over. You become a Learner of Jesus once again. You go back to why you fell in love to begin with. I promise you this much, if you make the effort to learn about Him, you will find the excitement again. Go ahead, open your Bible to Colossians or 1 John or anywhere else and learn more about Jesus. He will meet you more than halfway. As you become a “Learner of Jesus” you will become a “Lover of Jesus”.