In his classic manual, Mere Christianity, CS Lewis discusses the issue of loving God.
“People are often worried. They are told they ought to love God. They cannot find any such feeling in themselves. What are they to do? The answer is the same as before. Act as if you did. Do not sit trying to manufacture feelings. Ask your-self, ‘If I were sure that I loved God, what would I do?’ When you have found the answer, go and do it.”

I have always thought it to be like a train engine that pulls the cars along behind it. Sometimes our actions need to pull our emotions along. It sounds a bit insincere I suppose, when it seems your heart isn’t really in it. But consider the alternative: not acting on love simply because we can’t find the matching emotions! Goodness, how many times do we find someone unloving, or are quite unloving ourselves? I think of the snotty-nosed poor kids we held in Bolivia with who knows what all over their shirts and pants. Not a very compelling visual for love. Or consider the teenager who cries out such angry words at their parent. Are we to abandon love because we are confronted with the unlovely? Or consider our own sometimes apathetic and unloving response to our God. Where would we be if God demanded a love-worthy attitude before he unconditionally poured out his love on us? God demonstrated his love toward us while we were still rebelling against him! (Romans 5:8)

And isn’t the test of real love found in its ability to express itself against all odds, when love itself might not be returned? After all, anyone can love the lovely, especially when there are indications the love will be repaid. CS Lewis continues in his essay, “Christian Love, either towards God or towards man, is an affair of the will.” In other words, feelings will come and go. But the commitment to keep loving does not get carried away by every emotion. If it does, it is likely not real love.

Are you feeling full of love today? Great! Share it with God and with those around you. Do you find the feelings of love have escaped your heart? BE loving anyway. Let your will to love carry you and keep carrying you even if the emotions of love are slow to follow.

“(Love) always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” 1 Corinthians 13:7-8a