Article November 6, 1995 Issue

The joy of unselfed love

Margaret Coleman Brown Poyser

Unselfed love—what is it and how do we obtain it? It's not oriented to a particular person or object, sometimes bringing joy, at other times bringing disappointment or rejection. Unselfed love has a spiritual meaning that becomes evident when we surrender the belief that we have a personal love to give or withhold and turn instead to God, divine Love, as the source of all real love.

We sometimes mistakenly think that we have to learn to love, especially to love those who are not so loving to us, or perhaps that we have to make someone else love us. Man, the reflection of God, doesn't have to learn to love; he already includes the qualities of Love itself. Human experience provides countless opportunities to put this love into action. And while we do not have to earn someone's affection, we do need to realize that it is God's love for His own, shining through us and the other fellow, that we are to feel and express. Unlike a personal sense of love that comes and goes with the tide of human emotion, God's love is always present and in operation.

Speaking of love, Mary Baker Eddy writes: "Love is not something put upon a shelf, to be taken down on rare occasions with sugar-tongs and laid on a rose-leaf. I make strong demands on love, call for active witnesses to prove it, and noble sacrifices and grand achievements as its results. Unless these appear, I cast aside the word as a sham and counterfeit, having no ring of the true metal. Love cannot be a mere abstraction, or goodness without activity and power" (Miscellaneous Writings, p. 250).

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