Life (5): You Deserve to be Loved!

Can you guess where these love quotes come from:
* "It doesn't matter if the guy is perfect or the girl is perfect, as long as they are perfect for each other".
- Good Will Hunting
* Love actually is all around us.
- Hugh Grant, Love Actually
* "Promise me you'll survive. That you won't give up, no matter what happens, no matter how hopeless". 
- Titanic
* "Death can not stop true love, it can only delay it for a little while."
- The Princess Bride
*"I loved her so much I had to kill her"
- Guns and Roses

Love is all around

Love is one of those things, from a young age we think we have it for someone and the oldies around us tell us that we don’t know what we are talking about. But, what is love? We all agree that it is a feeling, a strong emotion that drives us. Some of us even go as far as to say that love is an action, which speaks louder than any word could describe! We all agree that love is so important. It is an essential ingredient in our society.

I think a good expression of this is found in our families. Parents, on the whole, demonstrate love for their children. Feeding, washing, clothing, making our beds, putting up with our rubbish, reading us stories and the list goes on. The events that stick out in our mind as an act of true selfless love is when a parent puts themselves in harm’s way to rescue their child:

September 2010 – Brian Wood was forced to brake when an out-of-control SUV came hurtling towards him in an inevitable head-on collision in Whidbey Island, Washington State. He swerved his car so that he would take the brunt of the collision, sparing his wife, who was pregnant with their first baby. Brian sadly died, while his wife and unborn child lived.

The father-to-be gave his own life to save his wife and unborn child when he swerved his car to take the impact of a fatal head-on collision.

His shattered wife stated 'I am not going to waste the gift he gave us'.

This, without a shadow of doubt sticks out in my mind as a pure act of love, don’t you think? With selfless acts like this, you have to say that love is all around us, isn’t it?

What is love?

We are a loving society aren’t we? How about these love quotes from the ultimate lovers of this generation who influence the our families:
* He who loves 50 people will have 50 woes; he who loves no one has no woes! Budda
* My goal was to show true love between a man and a woman. Hugh Hefner
* I will always love Simone, I will make her my other priority (and I guess Liz Hurley would have to be the other half!). Shane Warne

I picked these blokes because Budda has been considered one of the world’s most influential teachers, Hugh Hefner’s porn industry is statistically the Western world’s favourite past time and Warnie is considered one of Australia’s favourite sons. Add to that statistics which demonstrate an alarming increase in relationship breakdowns, domestic violence and child abuse.

We all hold families and love as an important facet of our society but let’s be honest with each other, do we really understand what love is? Looking at the voices of our culture, my answer is no, because our society today looks for answers in the wrong place.

Jesus, our solution

I know this will hit some people really hard, as the majority of my own extended family has experienced the pain of relationship breakdown. Though, more and more, I am convinced that the answer to this problem is not better counselling or therapy, but we need what the bible calls a new heart.

The bible is essentially about Jesus, and it explains that Jesus is God, who created the universe to be in a loving relationship with him (I’ll point out there is more to this but God didn’t create us because he was lonely but because he is a loving God). But our relationship with God has been broken because of our rebellion. This separation from God is corroding all of our society because we live opposed to God and will one day face judgement.

So what is love? Jesus said “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends”(John 15:13). Love is an emotion that causes and drives us to act. Love is selfless and Jesus, who is God says that he loves us and he proves this by dying on the cross for our rebellion! Jesus does for us what Brian Wood did for his wife, and what did his wife say in response? We can’t and we won’t experience true love until we meet the inventor of love, Jesus Christ. Our lives, families and society are dying and Jesus, out of love died to rescue us from this corrosion.

You don’t have to do anything but trust Jesus, as it is written in the bible:

For our sake God made Jesus to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become part of God’s family (2 Corinthians 5:21)