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Fill Up My Love-Cup

In his book, The Five Love Languages, Gary Chapman speaks primarily to spouses about the different ways to love each other. He categorizes how we love each other into 5 different sections; touch, acts of service, time, words of affirmation, and gifts. The issue he deals with is that different people have different love languages. It can be frustrating to be married to (or friends with someone) whose primary love language is touch while yours is gifts. He encourages people to learn the love language of their spouse; and I would like to add to this by encouraging my readers to learn the love languages of their friends and family.

I've always enjoyed the concept of love languages because it's interesting to see how God made us all differently. Over the past several weeks I've been thinking about them when it comes to single people, specifically who fills up a single person's love cup? Then I thought about who fills up my love cup and the answer was so beautiful that I thought I should share it; God does. Even cooler than that, God speaks all the love languages.

1. Touch; He lives inside His people (1 Corinthians 2:10-12; 3:16)
2. Acts of Service; He does everything for you. He created you, placed you in your home/situation, and forgives you every day.(Psalm 16:5-6) And He uses people to care for you (Jeremiah 26:24)
3. Time; He is with us in our trials and test and always hears our prayers. (Exodus 2:12, Philippians 4:6)
4. Words of Affirmation; then entire Bible shouts out "I love you!" My pastor has been doing a sermon series on Song of Solomon in which God tells His church again and again "I love you." Here's a link to the sermon audio if you want to take a look.  http://www.sermonaudio.com/source_detail.asp?sourceid=faithtillsonburg
5.Gifts; the hugest gift that comes to mind immediately is Jesus. He came, lived with His disciples, died, rose, and went back to heaven. But there are other gifts too; trees, pumpkins, macaroni, dogs, spider webs, socks.

 It is undeniable, people are loved by God. The challenge sometimes is to look for ways we are loved. God shows each love language in a variety of different ways. He uses His Word to assure us of His love. He uses people to hug us, pray with us, bake us casseroles, write us cards, watch our kids, share a cup of tea, and sometimes to sit quietly and listen. He uses Creation with it's changing seasons, animals, stars, beach, etc.

Even in the bad days God shows His love. As you trudge through this world ask God to fill up your love-cup. He will. And He will amaze you in the ways He does it. He fills up my love cup in that quiet time that He meets with me as I sit in my comfy chair, Bible in hand. He shows me love when the little girls at church ask me to braid their hair, when my brother asks where I was, when I look at the world changing from pink and blue flowers to red and yellow trees. People will fail to show you love, even your spouse, sister, and best friend, but God will never, ever stop showing you love, because God understands perfectly how you need to be loved. Look for the ways that God loves you; I promise you won't be disappointed.




Food for Thought; it's also interesting to watch other people and discover how they need to be loved. My mom needs gifts, my pastor's wife needs hugs, my friend needs quality time. I would say my top love language is acts of service--gifts and touch are low on the list for me, but in order to show my mother and pastor's wife that I love them I need to give love in the way they understand. Also, remember that people love you even if they show it in their own language and not yours. My pastor's wife gives me a hug every time I see her; this is not my love language but it is hers so I choose to accept it as an "I love you", she's serving me in the way she knows how.



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