Perception of Love is not the Same as Love

I have had many a friend claim to be in love.  The scene goes something like this: boy meets girl, girl likes boy.  The two of them begin communicating and spending time with one another, mostly fun stuff to get to know each other better.  After some measure of time, the seriousness of their affections for one another began to crystallize until finally, often unexpectedly, one of the couple says those three words: I love you.  To which the reply is a reciprocation, a return of that affection by the same words.

Not in any way to discredit the reality of the situation, it needs to be said that this act is one of emotionality and is prone to passing as emotions do.   Without fail, this sentiment transforms over time and shifts in a variety of ways.  The initial excitement fades, the enthusiasm dissipates, and the enthrall at the other slumps under the hands of regularity.  What was once new and fashionable becomes old and out of style.  This, of course, is not to diminish the affections but to say that they have been altered over the course of time.

Sometimes, perhaps more often than humans would care to admit, as the previous passion dissolves and the couple starts to see one another in new lights that conflict with their original affections, the pair began to question what they really meant by I love you.

The truth is that there is a distinct difference between love and the perception of love.  Love is a deep activity that stems from the core.  It is a submission and a sacrifice as much as it is a desire for the other.  It is an output that does not demand the reciprocal.  Love does expect to receive it nonetheless, but not as a merit of love poured out more as a latent realization that love is a loop, like playing playing catch in such a way that you are simultaneously throwing and catching.

Being in love, though, is but a perception of love.  It is but a shadow left under love's light.  Considering the complexity of love as it is, any reception of love requires an interpretation of that love, as in, when someone loves another, the other must perceive that love.  Coincidentally, the perception of love is, then, not love much as smelling a cologne is not the same as the cologne itself.  It would not be inaccurate to paint this perception as somewhat elusive apart from clearly defined understandings of what love is, indicating at the same time what love is not.

Love is defined in Jesus.  He is the measurement of love.  It is how He fulfilled the promises of God in His life, His death at the hands of His accusers, and His resurrection that define love in the ultimate sense.  It is in Christ Jesus that we see true love in all its convicting glory and utter awesomeness.  Faith is the only appropriate response to that revelation, faith in the love that has been shown by God Himself.

Faith that love has occurred and is occurring in the relationship between God and man is the perception of that love.  It should be a reminder to us in all of our relationship that any fickleness or skepticism is not to be pressed on love, as it were, but should be blamed upon on anemic, Christ-less definitions of love.  Remembering the ultimate love that is Christ Himself will protect us in all our perceptions in life, not the least of which being in the area of love.