“My little children, let us not love in word or tongue (only), but in deed and in truth”(I John 3:18).
In our effort to encourage people to “love one another,” we must not leave the impression that words do not count. While deeds of love and other expressions are vital, a lot of people need to hear the actual words.
“I love you.” “You have no idea how much you mean to me.” “Thank you for being such a precious friend.” “I treasure you.”
Speaking love is a good thing to do.
First, something inside me needs to speak words of love. It’s good for me.
One day, my young grandson said, “Grandpa, why do you tell me you love me so much?”
How perceptive, I thought. And such a good question. Why do I do that?
I said, “Grant, the love inside me keeps building up and I have to let it out. And the only way to do that is to say the words.” Otherwise, I seemed to feel, I would explode.
This satisfied him. And it expresses the truth as well as anything I know.
Speaking love to someone dear to us can be a kind of pressure relief value. We will explode if we don’t tell that person of our love.
For this reason, writing a love letter to our sweetheart can be almost as good as receiving one from them.
It’s good for us to say “I love you.”
We have all heard stories of a husband saying, “Honey, I love you so much it’s all I can do to keep from telling you.” We want to scream, “Tell her! Tell her!”
You’ve heard of the trucker whose rig went off a Colorado mountainside in a snowstorm. He was found several days later, buried in the snow, his truck a crumpled wreck. During the hours before he died, the man had written a note to his wife. He told her how much she meant to him, and added, “I’m so sorry I never told you.”
That line is nearly as tragic as the wreck itself.
In Dan Fogelberg’s tribute to his father called The Leader of the Band, one memorable line stands out: And Papa, I don’t think I said ‘I love you’ near enough.
Most of us do not say it nearly enough.