As I said in December’s Thank You Note, Zebras and Magpies wouldn’t necessarily talk about trends, unless there is a burning matter. Then, an action might be necessary. And this time, the action is to remind you that love is not limited to a day, nor to the month of February, nor to a shopping list with overpriced bouquets, plastic, and toxins.

Love is freedom.

Or, as the Apostle Paul said:

“For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”
Galatians 5:13

While researching the origin of the word love, I got the opportunity to think of at least three new topics to write about, thanks to a contemporary digital dictionary trying to define love as:

“To like another adult very much and be romantically and sexually attracted to them, or to have strong feelings of liking a friend or a person in your family.”

In order to understand love, one must first learn that you cannot diminish love, nor treat it as a contemporary phenomenon. Love is indefinite, just like God.

To begin with, there are types of love — and some of them have nothing to do with liking or being sexually and romantically attracted to someone.

Philosophers, psychologists, theologians, neuroscientists, poets, authors, painters, sculptors, actors, linguists, physicists, and chemists; kings and rulers; astrologists, alchemists, priests, and monks; apostles and believers; warriors, and even kindergarteners have tried to understand what love is — never daring to limit its depth, power, and majesty.

Zoo keepers, volunteers, veterinarians, and rangers protecting endangered species have sacrificed their lives to teach us what sacrificial love is. Grieving chimpanzees and distressed elephant mothers have whimpered and rumbled; packs of wolves, and prides of lionesses have roared, cried, and howled to teach us the sound of losing the physical presence of love. Mothers lost in anguish have cut their hair after losing a baby; they have screeched, scratched, and endured being called mad for being separated from their newborn. Fathers have given up on their dreams to raise a family; coal miners have given up their lungs for food on their table. Partners have given up their careers, dream jobs, controlling families, and destructive people to rebuild their marriages. Doctors have given up on sleep to save lives and bring hearts back to beating.

None of them have given us a meaningless or shallow definition of love. They have shown us what love is.

Who dares to define love if one has not experienced it outside of the tiny box labeled as “liking and attraction”? It is the one who is afraid of it.

So don’t tell, don’t believe, don’t think that love equals liking or attraction. Love is an act. To act is to forgive; to be present; to be absent (when one asks you to); to go to the other room or come to it; to leave space and to fill in the space; to hug, to nurture, to caress, to touch or not to touch; to comb one’s hair when their shoulder hurts; to cook a soup for the neighbors who have an Alzheimer’s patient at home; to go to another city to visit the lonely ones; to pray over a friend’s health and safety; to let them know they are forgiven and precious. Love is feeding the homeless man; teaching the beggar kid a new language or an art; and telling them God has a different plan for them than life on the street. It is feeding the birds during winter, saving the neighbor’s cat that got hit by a car with your last money, and giving it back to them because it’s their last year together.

Love is an act of doing, letting go of, changing, learning, moving, staying, approaching, forgetting, reminding, cooking, cleaning, being intimate without being physical, being physical without being sexual, being sexual with tenderness and care. Love is loving the seemingly unlovable, forgiving the seemingly impossible, and giving to the one who, by all modern-day standards, does not deserve to be given to or loved.

Happy Valentine’s day, every day.

I hope you know that you are loved. On days when it feels like the world has forgotten you, do not think twice: go and love it. God will lead you where you need to sow love.

To know God is to know love. To let God love you is to know what unconditional love is. No other love is as His. There is no love without Him.
If you still doubt it, let these words lead you to freedom.

“The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: ‘I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.”
Jeremiah 31:3

“Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”
1 John 3:18

“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
John 15:13

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”
1 John 4:7–9

Song of the day: Where Is the Love? – The Black Eyed Peas

Thought of the day:
“For me, the truth is not something that can be said in a few words, and those who simplify the universe do nothing but reduce the breadth of its importance.” — Anaïs Nin, in her interview with Pierre Lhoste (1969)

Verses of the day: 1 Corinthians 13 or The Love Chapter

Documentary of the day: Storkman