How Do I Love Thee Jesus? - Romans 8:38-39

Cloud picture taken at Sertoma Butterfly House, Sioux Falls, SD                 Photo taken by Keren Shafer  7/4/2017

I too am convinced that nothing can separate me from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Jesus is Lord of my life. I love my husband. However, Jesus is my first love and I love Jesus in the same way as the Apostle Paul obviously did. Similarly, my husband loves Jesus first and myself second. This is the way it should be. Jesus is first in both of our lives.

These two verses from Romans have always reminded me of Elizabeth Barret Browning's sonnet:

How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
 1850

I believe Elizabeth Barret Browning may have been expressing her love for Jesus as much as she was expressing her love for her husband Robert. After all, she had read the New Testament and was familiar with these two bible verses.