Gutsy love

It was when I was doing a Youthwork training series called "Head, Heart, Hands" that I first came to grips with the peculiar case of the shifting emotions.

You see, like everyone else, I grew up thinking that when you love something or someone, then it's the pounding thing in your chest that is the centre and source of that thing we call love. Makes sense. After all, didn't it start to thump alarmingly when I first set eyes on on my dearly beloved? Didn't it race away when I turned and saw a vision of loveliness walking up the aisle to say "Yes" to be being with me for the rest of our earthly lives?

But it seems it wasn't always that way. For Hebrews and Greeks, the seat of the emotion was slightly further south than that. Whereas we might say: "I love you with all my heart", the proper rendering of Paul's declaration of love for the Philippian believers (1:8) is literally:

"For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ." (AV)

So rather than loving someone with all their hearts, they loved them with their icky plumbing. And that makes equal sense too. People who have fallen profoundly in love often describe it as being like a kick in the guts, or having a deep, visceral feeling of yearning to be with someone.

I doubt there will be many Valentine's Day cards sent and received today, or even heart-shaped balloons that are actually really heart shaped - we prefer a symmetrical, sanitised version of the heart for these kind of expressions of affection.

But it does make you wonder what a Hebrew or Greek Valentine's Day card might have looked like doesn't it!

Click the link - if you dare - to see a mock up of what Hosea, Samson, or Isaac might have sent to Gomer, Delilah or Rebekah.