I love you love me love.

Crazy little thing called love. Can't buy me love. Let's talk about love. Prisoner of Love. Secret Love. Dream Lover. A big hunk o'love. All you need is love. L-O-L-O-L-O-L-O-V-E. What is love? I want you, I need you, I love you. Saving all my love for you. Love will keep us together.You can't hurry love. I just called to say I love you. The power of love. Tainted Love. Addicted to Love. Vision of Love. Because you love me. It must have been love. Higher love. Have you ever really loved a woman? Love the way you lie. Bleeding Love.

I'll make love to you.

But maybe not how you're thinking...

I heard this today that put, in more concise words than I have been able to form, what it means to me to love:

"I love you, which by definition means I commit myself to serve you, to build you up, to cheer you on. I know full well this is going to cost me lots of time, energy and money, but I want to put your interests ahead of mine. I'll stand at the back of the line; you go first."

The cold, hard, deep, dark, painful truth is that if this statement isn't fully lived into-- love does not exist, and the lack or loss of love is a painful thing! I had a friend relate to me one time based on our own "loss of love" experiences. He said, "Okay, remember that feeling? Remember how dark it was?" It was... so dark. It seemed sometimes as if my heart would literally rip apart for grief. It really pains my heart to see the way we unconsciously live into a selfish way of love; all the while many of us think we really know what love is. But we do not. We do not because love is a verb, and must be lived out consistently. It truly is a surrender of self to the desires of another. That is a radical love. It encompasses all forms of love: tender love, tough love, and sacrificial love. Love is so much bigger than me. I can only hope in the one who is love.