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Love is patient, love is kind’
- 1 Corinthians 13:4
The apostlePaul describes kindness as love’s second characteristic. We show kindness to our husband or wife when we serve each other in practical ways. Within a marriage, this can take many different forms: making a cup of coffee, taking out the rubbish, cleaning the windscreen of the car, cooking a favourite cake, ironing a shirt. Of course, routine activities may be taken for granted, but, when they are done willingly, they constantly express love. However, it is the non-routine acts of service that communicate love most powerfully to those for whom this is one of the ways they feel loved.
Nicky:
I can recall many occasions when Sila has done things for me which I was not expecting. She has packed for me when I have had to go away overnight and have been under pressure. She has brought tea and toast to my desk when I have been struggling to prepare a talk. Often the crisis has been self-inflicted through taking on too many commitments and I have felt much loved by Sila’s thoughtfulness.
After many years of marriage, I continue to be amazed and delighted by all that Sila does for me, routine and non-routine. I sometimes catch myself wondering why she does it. And the only answer I can come up with every time is that she loves me!
In Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Dr Lannis succeeds in curing an old man called Stamatis of deafness by removing a dried pea that has been in his ear since childhood. Stamatis returns to the doctor to ask him to re-insert the pea as he cannot stand his wife’s constant nagging. Dr Lannis refuses, but suggests an alternative. He recommends a cure for his wife’s nagging:
‘My advice is to be nice to her.’
Stamatis was shocked. It was a course of action so inconceivable that he had never even conceived of conceiving it.
‘Iatre .. .’ he protested, but could find no other words.
‘Just bring in the wood before she asks for it, and bring her a flower every time you come back from the field. If it’s cold put a shawl around her shoulders and if it’s hot bring her a glass of water. It’s simple . . .’
‘Then you won’t put back the . . . the, er . . . disputatious and pugnacious extraordinary embodiment?’ [referring to the dried pea]
‘Certainly not. It would be against the Hippocratic oath. I can’t allow that. It wasHippocrates, incidentally, who said that “extreme remedies are most appropriate for extreme disease.” ’
Stamatis appeared downcast. ‘Hippocrates says so? So I’ve got to be nice to her?’
The doctor nodded paternally, and Stamatis replaced his hat . . . He watched the old man from his window. Stamatis went out into the road and began to walkaway. He paused and looked down at a small purple flower in the embankment. He leaned down to pick it, but immediately straightened up. He peered about himself to ensure that no one was watching. He pulled at his belt in the manner of girding up his loins, glared at the flower, and turned on his heel. He began to stroll away, but then stopped. Like a little boy involved in a petty theft he darted back, snapped the stem of the flower, concealed it within his coat, and sauntered away with an exaggeratedly insouciant and casual air.
The doctor leaned out of the window and called after him, ‘Bravo Stamatis,’ just for the simple but malicious pleasure of witnessing his embarrassment and shame.2
A strong marriage consists of both husband and wife finding opportunities to serve each other and to express their appreciation for what the other does. When life is hectic for us both, we instinctively think, ‘Why isn’t he or she helping me?’But when instead our partner asks, ‘What can I do to help you?’ or spontaneously does the job that we most dislike, this is unmistakably ‘love inaction’.
A friend describes the effect upon her of such acts of sacrificial love:
My husband often has to leave for work very early in the morning, before the children and I are even awake. Quite often, when we come downstairs, the dishwasher has been emptied, the table is laid for breakfast and he has left some little surprise for each of the children – nothing too dramatic – a jelly baby in an eggcup or a custard cream. When this happens, I can almost feel my heart physically warm as I enter the kitchen, and all three of us seem to start the day with a skip in our step (occasionally the mood lasts all through breakfast). The next challenge I face is to feel cheerful when it doesn’t happen. How quickly we take each other for granted!
