Help Heal My Marriage - 15. Love is a Choice
Daniel Crosby • February 3, 2025
15. Love is a Choice
Our culture has distorted the idea of LOVE. How’s that for directness?
Hollywood’s idea of love…Tik Tok’s idea of love…Our neighbor’s idea of love…
So what is love anyway?!
Love is the choice to seek only the best. It’s not just a feeling in the moment. It’s not just a logical thought either. It’s all of it wrapped up together.
Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
See where he said it takes the “heart, soul, and mind?” That’s complex!
This means that I should seek the best relationship with God, the best relationship with others, and the best relationship with myself.
Sometimes choosing what is best turns out to be what is the most difficult.
So what can help us choose love? Here are 3 ideas from Robert Sternberg, a psychologist that studied love.
1. Intimacy – Do you have fun together? Would you rather spend the day with your spouse or with anyone but your spouse? Do you play, tease, joke, talk, and dream together? Can you have conversations about hard things?
2. Passion – How’s your sex life? Is it growing and deepening or is it on the back burner and just a chore to check off the list? Do you kiss? Do you really kiss, like more than a peck on the cheek while walking out the door? Do you admire your spouse. Do you check them out when they walk away? Do you hug long and often?
3. Commitment – How strong is your trust in your marriage? Do you feel secure? Can you talk to your spouse about it if you don’t feel secure? Do you believe that you’d stay married even through a miscarriage, a life changing medical crisis, financial ruin, or an affair?
It’s Go Time:
Are your answers mostly positive to the above or do you need to get to work and begin making your love foundation a bit more solid? Maybe talk to your spouse about these big 3. Maybe call and set up an appointment with a counselor.
Every day I help hurting frazzled people by walking with them as they get back on the path toward becoming who God created them to be. Shoot me an email if there’s anything I can do to help you or someone you know. daniel@danielcrosbycounseling.com
“Uncomfortable: The Awkward and Essential Challenge of Christian Community” by Brett McCracken is a great book to read if you’re a church person or if you’ve become somewhat detached and frustrated with the church. McCracken challenges all of us, conservatives and progressives, to think about the WHY behind Christian community and one of the fundamentals of finding the WHY is approaching it with humility. Maybe you having it your way and telling everyone else they’re wrong wasn’t exactly what Christ had in mind when He instituted the church. iPhones and iPads seem to have morphed into iChurch in a sense. American culture has turned Christ’s church into a business that caters to our comforts aesthetically, relationally, and politically. It’s made us consumers, critics, and reviewers of the Church rather than servants of THE Kingdom. It’s not wrong to have preferences and to like some things better than others. Music, décor, and speaking style are all over the spectrum at different churches, but he argues that the point of picking a church and serving in it should be less about does it meet my needs and more about whether I’m showing up and using this place along with this group to glorify God. He annoyed me in parts because he steps on my toes but maybe we need that a little more often. If you’re disenfranchised with the status quo and you feel like it’d be good to be challenged about church then go grab “Uncomfortable” by Brett McCrackin.
Look for beautiful things when you're restless, uncomfortable, or on edge. There's something about acknowledging the good around us that helps us reset and realize that it's not all bad. If you're struggling to see beautiful things in the world, come see me and we can talk more about it. www.danielcrosbycounseling.com
“The Needs of the Heart” by Chip Dodd is a book that will blow your mind. When I picked it up, it’s a very small thin book. Less than 100 pages. I assumed I’d breeze through it in a couple of hours. About a month later I finished digesting it. The truth is we cannot fully live the life God has called us to unless we acknowledge that we do have needs, that these needs are good, and discover the healthy ways of meeting these needs. Chip takes common human needs like Security and Accomplishment and he unpacks what they really are pointing us to in his typical concise but brilliant depth. There’s no fluff here. With chapters just 3-4 pages each, you’re going to want to have a highlighter ready to underline, to ponder these topics, and maybe then to discuss them with someone you know and trust. You’ll come away from this book with a deeper sense what is already fulfilled within you and ones that might be lacking where you need to go do a deep dive with a lot of prayer and introspection. If you liked Chip’s book “The Voice of the Heart,” this is one is your next read. Go grab “The Needs of the Heart” by Chip Dodd.
