I Love Love

I saw these lyrics on a friend's away message on AIM today. It's from the song "Inches and Falling" by a band called The Format. I've never heard of the band or the song, but the lyrics caught my attention. Here's one of the choruses (chorus's? chorii?):

I love love
I love being in love
I don't care what it does to me
These pills are fine to pass the time
'til I find my new drug
Then
We'll take our chances
we'll last a month
we'll never speak again

I thought that was a very interesting commentary on love and dating in our society. People are more in love with love, or the idea of love, than they are with their significant others. Part of the blame is probably to go to Hollywood, but most of it just lies with us, because we fantasize about the perfect relationship, and are disappointed when it doesn't come around. Love has become a drug. People have to get their fix, or else they won't be complete. In a cruel twist of irony, love--intended as a selfless denial and focus on others--has become an idol for our self-indulgence.

Now I've never really been in love, so I'm probably not the best person to comment on this, but I've struggled through this before, as have many other people, I think. I've been in love with the idea of love, and all I know about it is that it causes problems. What happened to love being about commitment? When did love become a feeling to satisfy ourselves rather than an act of the will to pour out ourselves for other's sake?

Unfortunately, I don't think the song above actually resolved anything, but it did point out the problem. I think the solution (if you can call it that) is to go back to Christ, the source of all love. He is the supreme example of love for us. God is love (1 John 4:8). And we need to learn what an idol our society has made of love. We worship it, rather than its Source. We need to get back to love as a commitment, not just a feeling.

I'll end with words from my dear friend Trey, who I think is spot on in this: "I believe that real love is a thing of the will and of reason, and that emotions follow a decision to like or to love someone. I don’t just mean this in terms of romantic relationships, but in all relationships. Try it sometime: choose to care about someone, then act like it, and then feel it."