Where is Love? Love symbolized by the heart though is not in the heart. Love is not of the flesh, but of spirit. The heart merely symbolizes life and love. Love dwells in the soul and is a gift from God.
Love, then, is not an object, but a person, Jesus. He is Love and we love Him because He loved us first.
Many love but love wrongly. They love objects or worse, they reduce persons, including Jesus to an object. Objectification of another easily uses the other for selfish gain. But love is anything but selfish gain. Love selflessly gives of oneself to another.
Covenants break us free from this objectification of of the person. Covenants exchange persons in which both state:
“I am yours and you are mine.”
This exchange, goes beyond the physical, even rational characteristics of a person. It encompasses the whole person, including their faults and sins as well as their talents and graces. In this exchange both become bonded. They create a soul tie by which they exchange their life for each other freely and totally.
In this exchange, the covenant tie creates an indwelling in each other and no greater example exists than marriage. As husband and wife abide in each other’s hearts, the two become one. Not just physically through intimacy, but spiritually as they have one soul: their love for each other.
Covenantal love is Jesus’ desire too. He makes a covenant with us declaring this is my body and this is my blood which He gives to us out of love.
Jesus exchanges his Divinity for humanity
so humanity becomes divine.
He becomes everything we are so that we could become everything He is.
Jesus dwells within us through the Mystery of the Incarnation; He also dwells within us through the Mystery or Covenant of the Cross: the Eucharist.
In the Eucharist, Jesus reveals the depth of this indwelling as He not only dwells among us as a person, but He becomes one with us at communion.
He, the Son of God, takes upon Himself our fallen human nature. In so doing, He becomes the Priest Who offers His human nature as a sacrificial offering, destroying our sin and death. Healed, He restores our covenant with Him through his divine love.
He literally joins Himself to us through the New Covenant, the offering of His Body and Blood. During the Passover Meal in the forms of Bread and Wine, Jesus exchanges his total self so we can abide totally through, with, and in Him.
In his love, we love because He poured Himself into us. United, we love each other as He loved us for our love joined to his, becomes pure.