Ragamuffin Ramblings

"Love is different than you think
It's never in a song or on a TV screen
Love is harder than a word
Said at the right time, and everything's alright
I said love is different than you think." -Caedmon's Call

Ah, the season of love has come... and passed. Valentine's Day: that time when you remember those you love or when you frantically search for someone to love you. It is a joyful time for some, sorrowful for others. Often we get so wrapped up in who is loving us that we forget to love others. Somehow Valentine's Day has become strictly romantic, stripping the word 'love' of its full meaning.

You see, I love different people for different reasons. I love my mother and father because they have raised me up into who I am today. I love the guys on my hall because they are my support socially and spiritually. And I love all my friends (or at least try to) because Christ first loved me. What has happened to Biblical love? The love that overflows from us because we are so thankful for God's love. We are supposed to be so overwhelmed by God's grace that we just can't help it. Love should be the natural result of our inward state. But so often our love is motivated by other factors or conditions. Imagine if God operated like that. His love would be based upon whatever he deemed to be 'lovable.' How tragic that would be! Thank God for his un-conditional love!

I also believe that what we learn about love from songs and movies is often NOT representative of Biblical love. The love I see in scripture is one that made the blind see, washed the feet of sinners, and drove the King of Kings to a bloody death on the cross. Love is not just that feeling of nervous excitement or anticipation. It is not just those butterflies that seems to course through your stomach when that special someone says hello to you. Love is not strictly romantic. It is more than that. Love is decision and sacrifice. Andrew Peterson puts it this way:

"Now, love is not a feeling in your chest
It is bending down to wash another's feet
It is faithful when the sun is in the west and in the east
It can hurt you as it holds you in its overwhelming flow
Till only the unshakeable is left
'This new command I give you,' he said, 'Love as I have loved.'
So, brother, love her better than yourself
And give her your heart."

So amidst the candies and the flowers this month, remember that love is different than you think.

These are the lyrics to an old Chris Rice song; I felt like sharing them in light of last week's awesome Prayer and Praise Chapel and Holiness Emphasis Week. Enjoy!

I hear a sound and turn to see
A new direction on that rusty weathervane
Suddenly the dead brown leaves are stirred
To scratch their circle dances down the lane

And now the sturdy oaks start clapping
With the last few stubborn leaves that won't let go
I can hear Old Glory snapping
And her tattered rope now clanging against the pole

And my breath is snatched away
And a chill runs up my spine
Feels like somethins on the way
So I look up to the sky and

From the corners of creation
Comes the Fathers holy breath
Riding on a storm with tender fierceness
Stirring my soul to holiness

I see the lifeless dust now resurrected
Swirling up against my window pane
And carried across the distance
Come the long awaited fragrances of earth and rain

And out across the amber field
The slender grasses bend and bow and kiss the ground
And in them I see the beauty of the souls
Who let the Spirit lay them down

And it takes my breath away
And a tear comes to my eye
Feels like somethins on the way
So I look up to the sky and

From the corners of creation
Comes the Fathers holy breath
Riding on a storm with tender fierceness
Stirring my soul to holiness

And like a mighty wind blows with a force I cannot see
I will open wide my wings and let the Spirit carry me

From the corners of creation
Comes the Fathers holy breath
Riding on a storm with tender fierceness
Stirring my soul to holiness

I hear a sound and turn to see
A new direction on that rusty weathervane