Love and Feeling

Love and Feelings in Marriage...

I heard someone say over the radio as touching marriage that "Love is not a feeling, but a (daily) decision".

Allow me to add this; even thou Love is not a feeling, it brings "feelings" when you nourish and cherish with it. What does the scriptures say about this? The Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5:25-29 compared husbands to Christ in how He loves: Christ being the standard that everyman must follow and emulate. [Please note that Christ NEVER divorced His Church, and NEVER plan to do that in eternity]."Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might SANCTIFY and CLEANSE it with the washing of water by the word, That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but NOURISHETH and CHERISHETH it, even as the Lord the church:".
 
Why is love this important?
Love has now become a commandment we must carry out between God and ourselves.
"Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." Mat 22:37-40. All that God wants is love! Nothing less than love working in and through all we do. When you love, you are treating yourself really good, and this brings real good feelings.
To Whom that Must Love.
When you love someone, there should be release of "feelings" accompanying it. 2Co_9:7 says; "Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver." This applies directly to us that Must do (i.e, give and receive) everything in and through love. And it also says that a man that loves himself, nourisheth and cherisheth his body. He really feels good when he treat himself to good things. So also must it be when you give in love. This is what Must be practiced at home and in the church before God.

To Whom that is Loved.
Love the scripture says, sanctifies and cleanse the loved ones. Sanctification and cleansing is no easy thing for it's at most a "painful" process of letting go. The process where we let go of the old nature we've been used to. This is "the Call" in this passage of scriptures. The Apostle also used the bond of love between Christ and His Church to give a clear understanding of how we should bond in marriage, that Christ through love is sanctifying and cleansing His church for glory. Love is God's "tool" for working out the best in His church, and so it is for husbands in marriage. We are all the body of Christ, and must endure this process till it's completed.

So here's my conclusion, Love is not a feeling, but what must bring good and everlasting feelings at its perfect completion when we nourish and cherish it, even thou sanctification and cleansing could be painful.