A strangely thought provoking lyric

I heard a great lyric tonight. It was from Phil Stacey's self titled debut album. I know it came out a couple of years ago but I'm just getting around to listening to it. The song is called "Looking Like Love" It's got a pretty cool toe tapping country rhythm. Anyway, the lyric I heard just made me smile as I was driving in my car. The song is one of those retrospective love songs, looking back on the wonderful times of young love.

I was thinking back to my first girlfriend and the strange and wonderful feelings of young & naive "love". When you're 18 with little experience in the world you don't really know what love is. But at that time it is the most intoxicating feeling that there is. When you're with the person it seems like time stands still and when you're not it seems to do the same thing. The anticipation of being with that person is almost tangible. The feeling of driving in the car, so close that there is no need for a passenger seat and when you hold hands you would swear that their hand was custom fit for yours.


Young love is a beautiful thing and when I see folks in there 70's that appear to feel the same way I can't help but smile. The folks that are veterans to retirement who still get that silly grin when they talk about their special someone. That couple at the retirement home that makes a point, every day, to walk around the pond holding hands. They never speak a word but the look on their faces reveals the love that they have for each other. I'm certain that their years together have not been perfect. They've seen their fair share of trials, a miscarriage, a wayward teen, time when the other seemed so distant. Through it all love endured. In fact it was love that carried them through. We have the idea that love is this warm fuzzy feeling that we have inside. I'm not saying that we don't get a warm fuzzy feeling when we're "in love" but that isn't what love is. Love is what's left when those "young love" feelings go away. Love is what happens in spite of everything.

The bible says "4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance." 1 Corinthians 13(NLT). I'm particularly fond of verse 7 "Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.” When I first started reading these verses it was suggested to me that I replace the word love, in these verses, with the name of Jesus. Wow, how powerful! Jesus is patient and kind. Jesus is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. He does not demand His own way. He is not irritable, and He keeps no record of being wronged. 6 He does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Jesus never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance." Jesus is love. He is the human manifestation of God's love for His creation; the part of God that came down to earth to live among us and feel the pain we feel. Even to endure the pain of the cross. I still have a difficult time wrapping my mind around that fact that God loved me so much that He sent His Son to die in my place. That is a love that I hope to pass on to whomever I come into contact with. How can I not, that love lives within me.

I'm not perfect and I often get in the way of that Love, but the more I come to know that Love the more that Love spills out in what I do. It's my hope that when people look at me they don't see me but see the One who lives within me and is the only one who truly knows what love is and how to love.

Oh yeah, so the lyric that got me thinking. Here it is, "And I kissed you on your smile.". Have you ever known someone whose smile was so infectious that you thought, maybe if I kiss their smile I might catch what they have? That's what I hope people think when they see the love in me, that if they come in contact with me they might "catch" the Joy and Love that is within' me.