How to Love?

1 John 3:18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

When I was growing up, I watched TVB serials. In those drama episodes, love is usually the main theme and I learned that to love means to give unconditionally under all circumstances. I concluded then that the quantity of love (if love could ever be measured) was proportional to the amount of pain one had to go through. Hence this delusion shaped the way in which I handled my early relationships. Eventually I realized that the phrase "to love" is incomplete; it should be "to love with actions and in truth."

To love in truth means that we do not love blindly. We love unconditionally, just like how God love us without any reservations. Nevertheless, many are confused between 'loving unconditionally' and 'loving in truth'. We find it difficult to rebuke our loved ones. We aspire to accept all bar none about our loved ones, forgetting that this brings more harm than good. We offer various excuses when things go wrong in the relationship. If we think through carefully, are all these right? Do they make sense?

To love with actions is easier to explain than to execute. Lip service is convenient and offers temporary solutions to many of our problems at present. Not to mention, many who are at the receiving end do not mind the lip service. So what's the harm here? In the long run, lip service brings us to discontentment and disappointment.