If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. 9We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. 0But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled. When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good. We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.
– 1 Corinthians 13

Before I headed out today to a SU planning day I wanted to add a song by Ashlee Simpson titled “LOVE,” it’s had a lot of airplay lately, as has Pink’s new track mentioned below, what strikes me is that for a song that’s apparently all about love it says very little about it. Ashlee keeps singing “I’m talking about love” but it seems that she’s limiting her talk to the spelling of the word as apart from it’s meaning, and in the clip that goes with the song she’s seeming to be getting over a boyfriend and dancing with friends than expressing it.

I wonder what Ashlee knows about real love, now I’m talking about love, the sacrificial, give it all, to death, stand up for you, open arms, better or worse, i forgive you, was your feet with my hair and tears, drop my family and my fishing boat to follow you kind of love… the kind of love that man of us really can’t explain. Paul in the verses above explains what love is in this famous passage, and when i sit it alongside Ashlee’s version of love, which she sums up as “an energy, a mystery, meant to be true, a part of me, the heart of me, the best thing we do” I know which one describes it better.

This song comes from someone who sounds like they’d like to talk about love but who doesnt know it for themselves, and it’s been picked up by a generation who needs to know what love really is… and I wonder if we’re ready to not only talk about love but to live it…

Love
by Ashlee Simpson
Album: I Am Me

“L-O-V-E”

I’m talkin’ bout love
All my girls stand in a circle and clap your hands this is for you
Ups and downs highs and lows no matter what you see me through
My boyfriend he don’t answer on the telephone
I don’t even know where the hell he goes
But all my girls we’re in a circle and nobody’s gonna break through

L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Im talkin’ bout
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O

I’m talkin’ bout love, say you’ll be my girls for life
Girls for life
Oh hold up, I need another one
I thank you, you do too
Grab my bag, got my own money
Don’t need any man in this room
My boyfriend he’ll be calling me now anytime
I need all my girls to keep him off my mind
So hold up we need another one
What we got is all good

L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talking bout
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O

I’m talkin’ bout love
Love is an energy, love is a mystery
Love is meant to be true
Love is a part of me, love is the heart of me
Love is the best thing we do

I’m talking bout love
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout love
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
Oh did you hear me say?
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout love
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout love
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout love
L-O,L-O,L-O,L-O-V-E
L-O,L-O,L-O
I’m talkin’ bout im talkin’ bout im talkin’ bout love