אהבה

Transliteration

'ahabah

Pronunciation

a·hab·ä

Three Hebrew words make up the translation into English of Love. It shows how redundant our language can become.

First comes

Transliteration ra`yah

Pronunciation rah·yä'

Second comes

Transliteration 'ahabah

Pronunciation a·hab·ä

And third comes

Transliteration dowd

Pronunciation dode

ra `yah is the kind of love two friends have. It's better than companionship, because it's like saying I've seen you in the good times, and I've seen you in the really bad times, and I'm still walking with you. That's a good friend.

dowd is what people try to recreate in sex. It doesn't work because sex is the final outworking of a great love. It can be translated as a mingling. But a deep mingling of two souls.

'ahabah is the bit linking to two. It's more than commitment. It's when your spouse is about to kill you and you stand there with them and say 'I'm not going anywhere.'
It's beyond commitment. When you have such great hostility thrown at you and you stand, or hide behind something but still very much in the same room, and say '...there's no place I'd rather be than here, right here with you.'

That's an insane kind of commitment, that is more than someone who stands by you when you're in a bad place, under attack from something, or everything just seems to be going wrong, they stand right there with you, holding you up while you take flak.

They stand right there with you while you pour hot coals over their head, or punch them in the arms, or steal something from them, take a pleasure away from them, they stand by you. Telling you, "I'm not going anywhere."

This is God to you. How much have you done to go against His friendship? Hold everythnig back because you want it to be yours? Not involved Him in something He knows He needs to be involved in? Simply ignored His outstretched hands continually? Or even you lead yourself into a terrible place of having nothing, no one around you, and no support wherever you turn. You've put yourself in a place where everything just falls down around you.

Jesus just turns to you and says, not only, 'I'm right here with you,' but also, "and I'm not going anywhere. There's no place I'd rather be than with you."