SATURDAY THOUGHTS: YOU CAN'T MAKE THEM LOVE YOU

 Sunday sermons—listening to them or writing them—are often sources of creativity in my personal life. In church, it's reiterated many times that we can't "earn" salvation as a Christian, but that it's the gift of God through His grace. It got me to thinking that love, romantic love, is like that. In fact, in one of the movies I was watching on the Hallmark Channel one of the characters actually said, "You can't earn love."

Is that true? Well, I've written about that right here, that you can't control when romantic love will show up in your life—or with who. I certainly think you can't "make" someone love you if they already don't, just like the Bonnie Raitt song says. The best we can do is be ready for it when it shows up, and learn how to recognize when it does.

Th difficult part is wanting it to be there when it isn't. Unlike God's forgiveness, which is always available to everyone, love can hurt by its absence, or disappearance. I don't know why it isn't there, or why it goes away, but it hurts like crazy when it does. 

So—be open to love, be careful in looking for it, and learn to recognize it when it happens. As for the suspected loss of love, as in the second-chance romances I write about, the best advice is paraphrased from the movie Shoes of the Fisherman: "If love seems misplaced, where did you last see it? If you can remember, then you know where to look for it. If you can't remember, then maybe it wasn't there in the first place."

Good advice for salvation or finding love. The two are related in my mind. Know how to recognize it, and let your soul tell you how to accept it with joy.