What’s love got to do with it?

I remember the day in 1999 when I walked across a volleyball court to meet a girl who today is my wife. She was wearing an athletic outfit and a cute baseball cap, and I couldn’t believe someone could look so beautiful. It wasn’t long before I was smitten; I had fallen in love.

If you are married, or have ever fallen in love, you know what I mean. When you first meet that special someone, your palms get sweaty just thinking about them, and your knees start to shake when you get close. After you get to know him or her a little better, you even made up silly names to call each other — those that, if uttered in public, would make others gag.

If it’s possible to be so captivated by someone that you would make a vow to love him or her until death, then why do so many people get divorced? Is it really true that you can fall out of love with someone? I guess that depends on whether you get your advice from the Bible or Dr. Phil.

If you read this column in the Jan. 21 Frontiersman, you may remember we talked about spiritual growth being the key to a healthy walk with God. To understand our relationship with God, the Bible gives us the example of marriage. Jesus Christ is the groom, and we as Christians are referred to as the bride of Christ.

So if Jesus compares our relationship with himself to a marriage, then there are common principles that relate to both spiritual growth and a marriage. The answer is found in the Bible when Jesus was speaking to the church in Ephesus, a town in the country we today call Turkey.

Revelation 2:4-5a says, “But I have this complaint against you. You don’t love each other or me as you did at first! Look how far you have fallen from your first love! Turn back to me again and work as you did at first.”

The heart of spiritual growth and a healthy marriage is actually quite simple. We must return to our first love. Many people somewhere along the way went from being in love with their spouse or with God to simply loving them. I love my mom, and I would do anything for her, but there’s a reason why the Bible doesn’t compare our walk with God to a mother-son relationship. Only a marriage is the closest, most intimate relationship a person can have on this earth.

So, how do you return to your first love? You must go back and do the things you did when you first fell in love.

When I first started dating my wife, we would hold hands until our fingers went numb. We would rack up enormous phone bills talking to one another for hours on end. We would write each other real letters and send cards (none of this e-mail and text message cheating we have today). I would open the car door for her to get in and hold the door for her as we entered a restaurant.

All of these things are so simple, and yet for some reason, many people quit doing them. The good news is that the moment we return to the things we did when we were first in love, we also get back the sweaty palms and the giddy excitement we had at the beginning of our relationship.

The same is true in our walk with the Lord. The excitement that we had when we first became Christians was there because we were hungry for God, and hunger for God is opposite of hunger for food. The more you start to read the Bible and go to church, the hungrier you become. The more you eat from the table of righteousness, the more you’ll want to go back for seconds.

A simple card written from your heart can do more to ignite a lackluster marriage than all the diamonds in the world ever could. A heartfelt prayer of thanksgiving to the Lord for all he’s done can do more to rekindle a passion inside you for the things of God than thousands of hours of nursery duty at church.

God wants to know that he is first in your life. Your spouse wants to know that he or she comes in at a close second to God. When we set our priorities in the right order, our lives will almost seem to fall into place.

Jesse Miller is youth pastor at Family Christian Center in Palmer and can be contacted at silverhonda84@hotmail.com.