I’m a fan of Dr. Gary Chapman’s classic book The Five Love Languages. The basic premise is there are five ways people express and receive love. The five love languages are:
- Words of Affirmation
- Quality Time
- Gifts
- Acts of Service
- Physical Touch
Though we may use several of these love languages or even all of them, we each have a primary mode we default to in order to show and feel love. This is our love language (and often couples use different ones).
It took me a while to figure out my primary one, but it’s words of affirmation—and being a writer, this makes a lot of sense. My inclination is to use words to express love to others and hear words as their expression of love to me.
Does love language apply to God? I think so and so does Dr. Chapman with his book God Speaks Your Love Language: How to Feel and Reflect God’s Love. I’ve not read this one yet, but it is on my wish list.
While I don’t want to presume to know what the book says about how to show God love and receiving love from him, my mind is already formulating ideas. Words of affirmation, quality time, and acts of service are all easy parallels to see.
The love language of gifts could be money, but I suspect there’s more to it. That leaves physical touch. Do we understand it as a metaphor or is there a more practical application? I don’t know.
What I do know is there are multiple ways to let God know we love him and multiple ways for him to show love to us. One way isn’t better than another, just different.
May we each love God the way he has wired us—and not be concerned if it’s different from other people who may show love differently.
How do you show love to God?
Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.
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