Endless Love-Fact or Fiction?

What do we think love is?  If we are going to identify something as the most elevated of emotions, we should have some idea of what we are talking about.  It is a feeling that manifests in our lives in varying intensity.

We like to think or say that love is in our hearts but in reality, love develops in our mind. It is cultivated and stored in the cells of our brains and our bodies in ways we hardly comprehend. Neuroscience has revealed to us how neurochemicals, receptors, and electrochemical functions operate. 

This emotion can and does act on our whole body. We know our heart is affected in a physical way at the sight or thought of a special person we love. These feelings seem to extend to all of the nerves in our body at times. Don't some refer to the depression that sets in when love or a loved one is lost as a broken heart?

Like words, emotions are recorded and stored as electrochemical light and energy in a format more powerful than any computer.  No computer can convert information into emotion or convert emotion into a physical experience like the human experience.

Our feelings or emotions go into action according to the stimulus we might receive. We also create them by choosing to act on the knowledge we gain in our associations and activities. This causes me to think that our mind is more than our just our brain. Emotion is science and I think it is a more powerful science than we understand at this time. 

You can't speak of love having an eternal nature without some theological underpinnings. How trustworthy are the opinions and musings of social scientists and scholars.  Their temporary views on relationships and most orthodox theological concepts terminate marriage at death.  Then also there is that streak of individual philosophy that each person seems to think they have all the answers.  

Where does our natural intelligence come from?  How does such a complex emotion develop in beings living on a world in an endless cosmos?  Are we mere creatures of evolution, some spontaneous creation of a bored deity or are we of divine origin in a never-ending order of familial relationships of a higher order than we now know? 

Is love limited to a single planet?  Just because we can look billions of light years away doesn't mean we can even begin to behold of the worlds without end throughout eternity and endless space. Even so, orthodox theologians have concluded that love did not exist as a mortal attribute until human history began some 6000 years ago. 

Life is and should be more abundant because of love, not limited. God's love compels them to give more, not less.  To bring about the perfect love of God involves a sacrifice, to a degree we may not comprehend in our present circumstances.

The perfect love of God is the perfect balance of justice, mercy, compassion, and forgiveness. We too can develop these principles with faith, effort, and much grace because of their sacrifice. Ultimately love is an endowment that we must seek with real intent.

Love, like all characteristics, is developed in a progressive way through interaction with others. It starts before birth when we lived with God. It is the love of God for their children. In this mortal life, emotions are intensified in our physical body and we are exposed to a spectrum of opposing choices that require our decision to actuate.

Opposition in life can manifest itself as handicaps or disruptions in our organic chemistry that are out of our control. Other attributes and addictions that we choose can also cause us to lose our ability to control our thoughts and actions.  

Imagine how easy it would be to love others if everyone was nice to us. Loving those that may not love us is the power of love. When we are released from mortal limitations it expands potentially to a fullness of God.  The perfect love of God causes joy.  We can be endowed from on high with capacity beyond what we ourselves might experience even to receive a fulness of godly attributes.

This is light and truth that exists in each of us and we can develop it. We must recognize that opposing vices also exist to every virtue. We would call hate and darkness an opposite to love and light or sweet to bitter or good to evil.  

If there is such a thing as true love there will undoubtedly be counterfeits as well.  If we fall in love can we not also fall out. Love is a choice. Without natural opposition, there is no real experience for freedom of choice or emotional development.

As eternal beings and on the higher level, love develops in our natural intelligence which is part of our spirit.  It develops through experience and service. True love inspires selflessness and acting for the good of others as opposed to selfishness or self-preservation. This is the highest level and order of development of both emotion and intelligence. 

We develop love and other attributes and emotions by our thoughts, pondering, reading, entertainment and from mentors at home and elsewhere. This is part of the stimulus we submit ourselves to as naturally existing beings in a life experience designed for this purpose.  How we act reinforces what we accept. We choose which stays and which goes and how it plays into our eternal development.  This is the agency associated with our will to act.

The principle of agency gives us the opportunity to choose between good and evil and to act without coercion. We are subject to the natural consequences of the eternal laws and natural laws that govern our existence. Agency contemplates a principle greater than so-called free will because agency associates us with an eternal identity and gender.

The creation of our spiritual body is the result of the perfect love of God. What else would it be? The image of God the scripture says is male and female. If love is not connected to a relationship and creation then it would have centered in nothing and therefore not existed.

We were created male and female in the image of God, this is the eternal pattern of creation. Love is the source of God's desire to lift us to our full potential. The creation of the earth and the pattern of life is for our benefit, blessing, and progress not for Theirs.  

There is no creation without both motherhood and a fatherhood. This is self-evident truth manifest in the earth and eternal law. Likewise, there is no continuation of love without this creative process. 

We are the literal sons and daughters of eternal parents and their love for us is based on this relationship. We should love one another because we are quite literally brothers and sisters.

Would God really create something out of nothing and then begin to love it on a random whim? If so we would be nothing more than pawns of creation.

Think of the love of a mother. It is quick and sure in most cases. The love of a father often develops more slowly through service to both mother and child. Once solidified it can become a bulwark of dependability and stability. 

The creation of our physical body is a similar pattern here in the earth. God has endowed us with the power to create children in our image and likeness. This process, however, doesn't always take place in a union of love and respect. 

Unwilling parents may not develop a love for or may even abuse their children in such cases. Others may be inspired to change, rise up and accept responsibility for their actions. Creation of life can change us and make us better if we will accept responsibility for it.

Most of mankind has the power to create life with some few exceptions. It is given to us as a natural occurrence and exists independent of how we might choose to develop our appetites and passions. Love develops not only by serving others but serving with them and being served by them.

The law of sexual integrity also known as chastity guides us to the highest order of eternal relationships.  This law is an eternal self-existing principle and more opportunities exist that we are not fully aware of at the present time. 

God ordained marriage for men and women and invites us to follow His pattern for the fullness and perfection of love. This is the transcendent opportunity to serve not only each other but with each other in sacred opportunities whether or not children come naturally to the union.

Living outside the bounds of these protections causes loss of the sensitivities that allow us to develop the full potential of this eternal emotion. 

Marriage is the commitment required to reach the full potential of love and it will be more than a lifetime process.  It is the process of eternal lives. This present life is one of choosing our eternal destiny.  If we refuse to obey the laws on which they are granted they surely won't. 

Our decisions do determine our direction and ultimate destiny. This is the law of Agency and the law of the Harvest. 

God will not force us to act in a holy manner just because he does. He invites us to follow because our eternal nature can develop to its fullest potential by doing so. This is the path to the exaltation of his children. This is the path of perfect and eternal love. It comes through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

See "The Family" a proclamation to the world.