Love and motivation

Right in the middle of that story about Jacob working seven years (and ultimately fourteen years) for Laban is an interesting little verse that highlights for us the power of love, and the link that exists between love and motivation. Genesis 29: 20 says that Jacob served seven years to earn Rachel's hand in marriage, but he loved her so much that those seven years felt like just a few days. You'd expect the opposite, wouldn't you? You'd think that the time would drag by, seeming like an endless wait for the day when he could finally marry the woman he loved so much.

What Jacob illustrates for us here is that true love is an incredibly powerful motivator. He was able to see Rachel every day, and that gave him the strength and motivation to persevere through seven years of hard labour, knowing that one day they would finally be together. It wasn't a burden, so strong was the motivating power of his love.

We can see this same kind of dynamic at play in the workplace. If someone loves their job, they probably feel that the time flies by. If they hate their employment and see it only as a way of putting bread on the table, they will probably find that time drags by excruciatingly slowly and that they live their work lives with the "Thank God it's Friday" syndrome.

Exactly the same dynamic plays itself out in our relationship with God. If we truly love Him, we will look forward to spending time with Him, and won't see our prayer times or daily Bible reading as a religious "duty" to be fulfilled. Time in His presence will fly by, and leave us longing for more. We won't find ourselves dragging our heels and struggling to be obedient to something He's asked us to do because, as the apostle John wrote in the New Testament: "This is love for God: that we obey His instructions. And His commandments are not burdensome for us." (1 John 5: 3)

If you love someone, you long to please them and you'll do anything for them. No cost is too high to pay, no expression of affection is too much trouble for us. Even the "hard" things (like Jacob's fourteen years of hard work) will seem worth it, because we are motivated by love. And when it comes to God, we know that one day (both now and and in eternity) we will spend the rest of our lives together.