Season & Savor: The Fruit of the Spirit, Part One — Love

Welcome to Season & Savor Sunday — because feeding our bodies is not enough.

I’d had a hard day of physical therapy on my neck. My head was pounding by dinnertime, and all I wanted was my couch and a blanket. Then my husband said he wanted to go visit a friend’s mom, who’s staying at a rehab facility near us.

I did want to do this, but I would have preferred another time; he really wanted to go now, right now. As we headed to the garage, something he said set me off, and as he pulled the car out, I was actually going to tell him to go without me (and not really in a loving way, if you catch my drift). I thought, he really wants to do this right now; let him do this one alone. I’d visit another time. Great attitude, Kathleen, way to go.

This post may contain affiliate links. Read my disclosure & privacy policy.

Instead, I took a breath, got in the car, and let it drop. I can’t tell you I had some big moment of clarity, thinking I was choosing “love.” I just decided not to make it a thing.

Funny thing, my headache actually started fading during the visit. Our friend’s mom was so grateful for the company. We sat and talked a while, and honestly, we listened more than we talked as she shared how she was doing. When we said goodbye, she prayed over us right there and blessed us. I didn’t see that coming, and it undid me a little, in the best way. I was really convicted about my own attitude.

That’s not a dramatic story. No one’s writing a movie about it. But it’s exactly the kind of moment Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians 13, and it’s where I want to start this new series.

I was retelling this story to my husband last night, and he reminded me of something he’d read in a book we’ve been reading. It resonated so much with what I’m sharing today that I had to include it:

“Hurry and love are incompatible. All my worst moments as a father, a husband, and a pastor, even as a human being, are when I’m in a hurry – late for an appointment, behind on my unrealistic to-do list, trying to cram too much into my day. I ooze anger, tension, a critical nagging-the antitheses of love. If you don’t believe me, next time you’re trying to get your type B wife and three young, easily distracted children out of the house and you’re running late (a subject on which I have a wealth of experience), just pay attention to how you relate to them. Does it look and feel like love? Or is it far more in the vein of agitation, anger, a biting comment, a rough glare? Hurry and love are oil and water: they simply do not mix. Hence, in the apostle Paul’s definition of love, the first descriptor is ‘patient.'” — John Mark Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry

Starting with love, because everything else grows from it

For the next several weeks, I’m walking through Galatians 5:22-23, the fruit of the Spirit, one fruit at a time. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Nine words we’ve all heard in Sunday school. Easy to recite, hard to live.

I wanted to start with love because it’s the root, or soil if you will, that the other eight grow out of. Paul makes the stakes clear back in 1 Corinthians 13:1 (NLT):

“If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”

I was curious about the whole “noisy gong/clanging cymbals” reference, so I did a little bit of research. Cymbals were actually used in the pagan worship of Corinth’s day, in the loud, showy rituals around gods like Dionysus. Lots of noise, nothing behind it. I think that’s Paul’s point. You can have the spiritual gifts, the knowledge, the eloquence, even great sacrifice, and if love isn’t underneath it, you’re just making noise.

Jesus said something similar when He was asked which command mattered most. Love God with everything you’ve got. Love your neighbor as yourself. Everything else, He said, hangs on those two.

So what actually is love?

I used to think love was a feeling; now I believe it’s mostly a choice.

There are plenty of days I don’t feel loving. Achy, tired, hurried, crammed too much into my schedule, headache kinda days, if we’re being specific. But I can still choose it.

Paul spells out what it looks like in practice, and this is the part I have on a cheap little wall art I bought years ago near my kitchen table as a daily reminder:

“Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8, NLT)

I read that list, and I wince a little. There are lots of “is nots, does nots, never, and always” in there. Keeps no record of being wronged? Oof. I keep records. Not proud of it, but I do, as much as I try not to.

Friends, I’m not there. I fall short of this more often than I’d like to admit. But I’m in process, and I want to love better than I did yesterday. That getting-in-the-car moment was one small step. Not a grand gesture, just a choice not to walk away.

Your one small thing

You don’t need a dramatic act of sacrifice this week. Just one interaction. Someone at the grocery store, your spouse, your kid, your neighbor, the coworker who’s hard to love. Choose it, even if you don’t feel it yet.

I’d love to hear where you land. Hit reply and tell me who your “one interaction” was this week.

Next week, we’re moving on to joy, and I promise it won’t be the greeting-card kind.

~ With grace at the table, and beyond

I read and respond to every email and comment, and I’m so thankful for each of you who comes back week after week. It means more than you know when you make my recipes and share your thoughts 💚