• True Love: Has a priority to maintain a close walk with God and desires to please the Lord above pleasing a guy.
• Infatuation: Thinks more about pleasing self and a guy than about pleasing God.
• True Love: Desires to please her parents and seeks their approval in a relationship with a guy (whether your parents are Christians or not).
• Infatuation: Desires to please a guy no matter what her parents think.
• True Love: Desires the approval of godly friends and spiritual authorities (Pastor, youth leader, Sunday School teacher) in her friendship with a guy.
• Infatuation: Develops a friendship with a guy no matter what others think and does not seek the approval of godlyfriends or spiritual leaders.
“Infatuation is but a beginning. The pleasurable feelings it creates are the Creator’s way to stimulate a man and woman to grow interested in one another, which can then lead them to marry, procreate and build secure and happy families. At this early stage couples make their relationship a priority; later they learn to accept differences and show each other appreciation” (Jen Aust, from article “What is True Love“).
The problem comes when we mix love up with its beginning stage: inflation. Too many couples are so attracted to each other that they make quick permanent plans to marry before they put the time and work and commitment into making sure they can keep the promises they make with one another.
Slow down. Do your “home work” in getting to know each other through the various seasons of the year and the many situations you can “learn through” to best know if your infatuation has grown to a mature love for each other. Make sure that both of you are as committed unselfishly to each other and to God and to resolving conflicts in godly, healthy ways. Don’t allow your feelings to blind you in such a way that you enter into marriage when you shouldn’t.
If you want to learn how to love:Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that” (Ephesians 5:1-2 The Message).
Fountain of Life
Welwyn Garden City