(from a netfriend):

When Mother Teresa of Calcutta was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize someone asked her what we can do to promote world peace. Her answer was deceptively simple but very much to the point, "Go home and love your family."

Unfortunately, the word love has gotten some poor press in recent years, and, as a result, it doesn't have the bite and meaning Jesus was talking about when He gave us His "new commandment." All too often we hear comments like, "I just love your new dress." Or, "I just love the sauce Bill uses when he barbecues chicken." Or, "Don't you just love the color on Hazel's new car?"

But Jesus' new commandment and Mother Teresa's formula for world peace is a much hardier and tenacious love than shows up in casual conversation and in television commercials. Indeed, Jesus' new commandment is not something we feel; it is something we do. Authentic love, the kind that binds us together as families, is not a euphoric emotion that sneaks up on our blind side. Rather, it is learned and relearned again and again.

I think Antoine de Saint Exupery, the French author and aviator, captured an important slant on love when he said, "Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction." It is looking outward toward common goals and desires that enriches the love between a husband and wife, that allows each member of the family to grow and mature as uniquely different individuals, yet bonded together.

Something else about Jesus' rugged kind of love was beautifully expressed by Paul when he wrote, "Love believes all things" (1 Corinthians 13:7, RSV). But that phrase might be better translated, "Love is always eager to believe the best." There's the model for us in our relationships--everyday believe and expect the best in each other.

As Mother Teresa implied--as we express our love within the family circle through words and touch and loving actions, we will experience a peace and joy that "surpasses human understanding" (Phillippians 4:7, JBP). World missionary Dr. Frank Laubach summed up the whole idea of Jesus' new commandment in these words: "When iron is rubbed against a magnet, it becomes magnetic. Just so, love is caught, not taught. One heart burning with love sets another on fire."

Father in heaven, help us love as Jesus loved.