The Language of Love – Part Three
“My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.” I John 3: 18
Jesus was the “Word … full of grace and truth.” The Bible tells us to “speak the truth in love.” Sometimes this mandates verbal communication. Sometimes it involves visual love. Do you know how to communicate the language of love.
Linus asks Lucy: “Why are you always so anxious to criticize me?”
Lucy: “I just think I have a knack for seeing other people’s faults.”
Linus: “What about your own faults?”
Lucy: “I have a knack for overlooking them….”
We speak the language of love when we reverse that and overlook the faults of others while working on our own.
Often the spoken word is intended to deceive while contrary action is planned. Jeremiah 9: 8 describes this: “Their tongue is an arrow shot out: It speaks deceit; One speaks peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, But in his heart he sets his ambush.” Speak the truth in love.
“I love you,” can be one of the most encouraging and motivating expressions uttered.
“I love you,” can be one of the most deceptive and damnable lies spoken. As a lie it is a plea and ploy to lower the drawbridge of our heart to allow a traitor entrance.
“A flattering mouth….” (Proverbs 26: 28)
Many problems in life are caused by the tongue. There is no easier way to sin than with speech. The tongue is in a moist place and can slip easily.
Communication involves listening. You speak the language of love every time you are willing to listen to a friend who needs an attentive ear. Few speak as well as those who silently listen. For five years, the adult education department of Minneapolis Public Schools offered two courses in speech and one in the art of listening each term. The speech courses were always filled. The listening courses were never held because in those five years only two students wanted the course. Everyone wanted to learn how to speak and no one wanted to learn how to listen.
Parents listen to your children. Husbands and wives listen to your spouses.
Swiss psychologist, Dr. Paul Tournier, once observed, “How beautiful, how grand and liberating this experience is, when people learn to hear each other. It is impossible to overemphasize the immense need humans have to be really listened to.”
Comic Lily Tomlin did a spoof in which she posed as an old fashioned phone operator. The popular line was, “Have I reached the person to whom I am speaking?” May love prompt you to listen in love and reach the person.