If you ask most couples who are thinking about marriage, or who are already engaged, why they are getting married, they usually will say: “Why, we’re in love.”

It has been through studying the Word, plus, over twenty-five years of pastoral counseling experience, that has prompted me to question the validity of this motive. Yes, love is essential and powerful!

However, if that is all you have, you will end up with nothing!

The number one mistake people make when they date is to look just for love. The number one mistake married couples make is thinking that their love is all they need. This puts their brains “on hold” from everything else. Yes, love is putting the precepts of 1 Corinthians 13 into action, but most people, including Christians, do not even know what real love is!

Choosing a life partner should never be based on love alone. A marriage cannot last on love alone. This may sound like crazy talk, but think it through. Have you ever seen a relationship work with just love? No, not for movie or TV stars who have everything going for them, not for the singers who sing about it, and not even for the Beatles! Because, they do not know what love is, nor do they really put it into practice.

We do not necessarily fall in love as the love songs and movies proclaim, because, you may well fall out of it, faster than you fell in it!

If you never choose to make it a commitment, with love, you will never have it, or, if you do, you will not keep it! Love is a verb; it requires action that is implied for being a verb, action to do something with it. What are you doing with it? Is it cherishing? Is it respectful? Or? Are the precepts of 1 Corinthians 13 being put into action with your friends, family, acquaintances, and your spouse?

If not, what is in the way of that verb action?