What is love?

It's a feeling, right? I mean, that's what everyone says. That's what you believe, because when you watch a movie or read a book with a romantic scene, it makes your heart leap. You FEEL it — sometimes from your head to your toes. It's a moment, a little slice of time — maybe even a 30-second commercial that makes you ewwwww and awwwwww and your heart does a little flippy-flop. 

Yep. It's a feeling. 

When you feel it, the emotion of love, directed toward another, then he feels it back. Or sometimes he doesn't.You either love someone or you don't, right??? It's not a choice. It's a destiny, completely out of your control. Like an emotion, a feeling. Right? 

But what about unrequited love. It's painful. Love should never cause pain. That was something else. A crush. Infatuation. Not love. Something that's supposed to be good shouldn't make you feel so bad… So, OK, love is NOT an emotion. 

But love, it's definitely a noun. It's a place you can find, if you try really hard. Not a place that you visit, but a place you can arrive at if you have a good map and the person reading it with you really wants to reach that destination, too. YES! YES! That's it! You fall in love — that place where you feel strongly for another person. Yes, you could spend eternity here in this "happily ever after." Right there. On the map!

Love is definitely a PLACE. Well, except, oh what about divorce. If love was a really a place, how could it go away after you get there? How could love possibly fall off the map? Cease to exist? Swallow itself whole?

OK, so maybe love isn't a place. Is love still a noun? Noun. A noun is categorized by people, place or thing. We know it's not a place or a thing. Is love a person? Who loves more than anyone? Jesus?

Is love Jesus? Jesus extended grace, forgiveness and mercy to EVERYONE. Not just Jews. But to sinners. He was definitely loving. And He commanded that we should "love our neighbors." 

Wait, these things Jesus did…they are all verbs. A verb? Could love be a verb? An act? 

1 Corinthians 13 tells us about love that it is patient and kind. It rejoices with the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love, writes the apostle Paul, is greater than hope and faith. 

What? How can love BE patient and kind? Can love really rejoice and bear all things? What things? Like my hurt, frustration and fears? Can love really DO that? How could love be greater than faith? Faith, it requires so much. And yet love is greater than faith? Really? 

Could it be that love is how we act out our faith, the very vessel of hope? 

If love is a verb, and not a noun, it means our service is love. What we DO, day in and day out, is love — or is not love. Our choices are reflections of our love. Our every word and action is a mirror held up to our hearts. 

Love sees the real person, but does not care about the sins, shame and darkness. Love pushes you toward the light. Love doesn't care if you are vulnerable or hurt or are without makeup. Love picks you up and dusts you off without condemnation, envy or anger. 

Love isn't afraid of pain or loss; love doesn't shy away from even society's most rejected. Jesus, he ministered to prostitutes and the hated Samaritans. Nobody was outside the reach of Jesus and his love. 

Love doesn't require a promise or commitment, just a moment. Love wants to be known and used, and even if you turn your back on it, love will extend its hand again and again.

Yes, love is definitely a verb, embodied in the life of Jesus, a noun. Love is compassion lived out in actions, choices, daily steps of faith ready to help us overcome pain, anger and emptiness. There, time and again to offer hope and healing.