What is Love?

Where has love gone?  Why is it that we only hear of the sexual self-desire for another being? Is that all that love is?

I am young still; but I remember a time in my youth when love was so pure a thought and desire.  It meant obedience and devotion.  It meant protecting and following.  It was self-sacrificing.  and it did not seem so extraordinary.  Yes, it was wonderful- miraculous and marvelous!  A thing to be sought after and desired; but it did exist- somewhere... It seems so far now... nearly out of reach... Where did that idea of love come from?

I remember my childhood and youth-filled "friends"... They were out of books- yes... but they taught me so much... in "A Little Princess" I learned love and devotion and affection (of an undefiled nature) through Sara and Ermengarde and Becky and Mr. Carrisford...  They were so devoted and looked after one another without resentment; without self-importance or pride.  they were not offended when it did not come to them.  And welcomed it when it did.  Oh- to be so pure and trusting and moral...

I think of Bree and Shasta (The Horse and His Boy); of Frodo and Sam (in the sense that the author meant their love and devotion to be interpreted); of the March sisters (Little Women)...The list goes on...

Oh- how I long to meet them again with sure accepting and loving, as I once did... Blind to their faults and so grateful for their examples...

My own experience and disappointments have changed me and made me so distrustful...  I wish I could be washed clean of all my per-conceptions (as a child is) and become eager to learn the correct way to do things once more... and to make the right choices... To be made exposed as a better person once I am on the other side of all these trials... As Sara said: 'Perhaps I have not really a good temper at all, but if you have everything you want and everyone's kind to you, how can you help but be good-tempered? I don't know" -- looking quite serious -- "how I shall ever find out whether I am really a nice child or a horrid one. Perhaps I'm a hideous child, and no one will ever know, just because I never have any trials'.  But I have had my trails- not all of them, I know...but they have proven me selfish and hardened...but then, I suppose that is the way it is supposed to be...When my faults are exposed and I am broken inside and out- then I see my sins and remember my maker and what I am supposed to have done and who I should follow and emulate in the future.

The one and only man that truly showed perfect and unconditional love...Jesus.  He died and paid my debt, so that I could live...whether I am willing to except it or not...He is so wonderful and yet He always turns attention toward the Father.  This is true love.  It can hardly be compared to all others...in fact they can only be compared to His Love for all...And He didn't even stop at that...after He died, so that I could live, He came back to life and went to prepare a place for all who will believe and will live for him (as simple as that) and waits for me...He even sent a Comforter and Helper so that I would not be alone (the Holy Spirit)...This Love is so beautiful and majestic, it cannot even be grasped with our finite minds...