DESCRIPTION:
Every now and then, a simple act of love reminds us all what it really means to love someone. This happened recently at a care center for patients with Alzheimer’s disease. A nurse who worked at the center noticed an elderly gentleman who faithfully visited his wife every day. Her disease had taken from her mind all memory of her husband. Still he came.

One day the nurse said, “Why do you keep coming? She doesn’t even know who you are.” He smiled and replied, “That’s OK. I know who she is.”

What this man understood is that true love sees past current circumstances and outward appearances into the heart—the true identity of another person.

It’s not easy to develop this kind of love, because it’s not easy to know someone this deeply and this completely. This is the kind of love that grows through years of caring, forgiving, and just being there for one another. For this reason, it tends to grow best in a family.

It often begins when a baby cries. Her parents do their best to discover what her needs are and give her their comforting care. Through each act of caring, they grow to understand her, to know her, and to love her more.

The more we help our children through the challenges of life, the better we come to know them, and in the process our love for them cannot help but grow. They might make mistakes or disappoint us, but we do not let those mistakes define them—we know who they really are.

But this kind of love is perhaps best expressed in marriage. As beautiful as the love between newlyweds may be, it is merely a foreshadowing of the far greater love that lies ahead. After years—even decades—of sharing their joys and sorrows, a husband and wife find their love to be so much deeper than they thought possible when they were first married, for they have learned who they really are.

Of course, all of this love is simply a reflection of the love of God, who knows who we are better than anyone. So, for example, when a husband holds the hand of his nonresponsive wife in a care center, he echoes divine love as he says, “I will always be here for you. I know who you are.”

Episode 4559. Aired January 29, 2017.