PASSION OR LOVE?

God's love enables us to 'love' others who are not at all like ourselves!

We live in an emotion-hyped culture today. We often define ourselves by our passions. Famous people on TV are asked about and admired for their passions even when their passions have no socially redeeming value whatsoever. I’ve heard people speak of having a passion for everything from concern for world hunger to a passion for things as insignificant as wearing the right make-up, or for red shoes, or working out at the gym, or for Starbucks coffee.

 I googled the word passion to see what would come up. Here’s is some of what I found: Any powerful or compelling emotion or feeling such as love or hate; a strong amorous feeling or desire; strong sexual desire such as lust. Passion is an intense and irresistible emotion toward a person or thing; a feeling of unusual excitement, enthusiasm or overpowering emotion. Passion can be used as a motivation for a person, an occupation, a cause, or a hobby.  The passion or emotion to want something strongly beyond what is needed is called lust, such as the fulfillment of sexual desires or even for food.  

And here are a few of the links that came up:  Poems about Passion, Finding Your Passion, Passion Test, Quotes about Passion, Characteristics of Passion, Finding Your Passion in a Quiz, Passion for Success, Passion for Something in Life, Origin of Passion, Famous Passion Quotes….to name a few.  About finding your passion in a quiz, it seems to me that if you didn’t already know, would taking a “passion test” bring you to the realization of what the commitment of your life really is, or should be all about?  Well, one thing is for sure, passion is fueled by feelings and emotions. So could we say that we live in a feeling or emotion driven culture today? I suggest that the “passionate” use of the word “passion” today leans in that direction. 

Curious as to what the bible had to say, I looked up the word in Biblegateway.com, my favorite online Bible go-to help.  The New American Standard Bible lists seven uses of the word as follows:

·  “A tranquil heart is life to the body, but passion is rottenness to the bone” (Proverbs 14:30).

·  “A wild donkey accustomed to the wilderness, that sniffs the wind in her passion. In the time of her heat who can turn her away?” (Jeremiah 2:24).

 ·  “But if they do not have self-control, let them marry; for it is better to marry than to burn with passion” (2 Corinthians 7:9).

 ·  “Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry” (Colossians 3:5).

·  “…not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God” (1 Thessalonians 4:5).

·       “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality” (Rev. 14:8; 18:3), used in speaking of Babylon which the bible refers to as “a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit.” You may wish to read the whole of Revelation 18 to see this statement in context.

 Yeshua’s experience on the cross is also referred to as His passion (see Acts 3:1), from the Latin verb pati meaning to suffer. I doubt that suffering is what we’re thinking of when we refer to our passion.  

As you can see, that’s a whole different perspective on passion than God’s idea of love. Biblically speaking, passion is something to be overcome, to repent of and to flee from, not to boast in nor seek in order to define or wrap your life around. Rather, passion is that which the ungodly partake of. It is listed as an idolatry, and we know how God regards that!

Is this just a matter of semantics, of redefining a word, or is there something else going on here? As I said in the beginning, we are a passion-hyped culture today. But if those are the true definitions of passion, do they not apply to our society today where it is equally sin driven?  Have we as Christians picked up the lingo of the world and applied it to how we feel about Yeshua?  Well, I would like to rescue here those believers who think there is something wrong with them because they don’t “feel” the passion others seem to.

There are some of us whose “lover” is broken. By that I mean they have been hurt, damaged, abandoned, abused…..  and more, and those  folks are often less likely to feel what others who have lived well loved lives feel, even about or from God. They love God and are entirely surrendered to Him, but when it comes to emotions, for those who have not known what it is to experience a secure and adoring love, they may not know how to receive it from God. But that does not mean that they don’t know that God loves them, or that they don’t love God. What they may not feel is the “passion” that others seem to experience, say, during worship.

 If that’s you, and you are afraid you don’t love the Lord as you are expected to because your lover doesn’t work as it should, take heart. This will release you from your malaise.  Let’s look at a very familiar passage of Scripture, 1 Corinthians 13.  But as you read it, I would like you to be looking for where your feelings are to be employed and where it speaks about “feeling” love toward others.  

“Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all thing. Love never fails” (:4-8a). 

Is patience a feeling or a choice to wait? How about kindness – do we chose to be kind or does it just rush over us as a feeling we can’t control? You get the point, I’m sure.  

Love, from a Hebrew or Scriptural perspective, is not a feeling but an attitude and a commitment. It’s not something that comes over you that you can’t control, like “falling in love” or for that matter, falling out of love.  Love is what you do for the benefit and betterment of the other person or persons. Love doesn’t brag because there’s nothing really about love in bragging; it’s all about you and calling attention to yourself. Love doesn’t keep mental lists of wrongs done to them, or remember the wrongs of the past, even if the past is still fresh. Forgive and let it go and it’ll dwindle, and if it doesn’t, keep forgiving till it does. 70x7, remember! Love rejoices with the one who rejoices. They’re just there with you and for you. Passions usually have to do with things or people that you personally relate to, that are you're kind of thing, but love, real love, loves those who are aren't the least like you (see photo above) but you know that God loves them so you can love them with God's kind of love. 

The best Person who will be with you when you’re loving like this is God Himself. When we love the way He loves, all kinds of possibilities and joys come to our lives.  Unlike passion that may or may not have anything to do with warming the heart of someone else, focus on living a life of God’s kind of love. Be an example to others of His love and you’ll find you’re loved in return.