Love Like Click-Bait: What You Need to Know
What is love to you?
We all say we want love. We all seek love.
I love the song, “Wake Me Up” by Avicii. In it, there’s a line that says, “Life’s a game made for everyone and love is the prize.”
But what is love?
What is Love?
I write this after a hasty cleaning of our familial bathroom. I wasn’t planning on cleaning when I entered, but I noticed the grunge building up on the sink-top, and decided to do something about it.
My mom likes nice things, I thought, as I moved the vases and tried to wipe some of the dirt away from underneath it. But with six kids still in the house full time, it’s hard to keep them nice and neat, especially when we the kids don’t share her definition of cleanliness.
So when I see dirt creeping onto the counter, or the dirty dishes beginning to pile up (7 kids can use a lot of silverware in one day, trust me), I feel something in my inmost being. It’s a desire to help my mother in anyway possible. I want to make her life easier, because I know she works so hard for all of us.
Now, if you were to take a look at our bathroom sink, you’d see it’s still fairly dirty. Like I said, it was a hasty cleaning, and I only used water and a rag. Had I more time more effective cleaning supplies, the change might be a bit more noticeable.
Why do I bring this up?
This is what love is to me.
Our society portrays love as something big and flashy. It’s like the BuzzFeed click-bait articles. You see it, and it connects to you for some reason. It pulls you in, making you think that this, this bright, showy, marketing driven sensation is what love us.
Now, that being said, I think there have been great strides in combating this belief. We’ve started to shift away from a sensually driven view of love into a realization that love is made up of the little things. Just recently, I saw a post detailing how true love looked like a man getting up an hour before everyone else to shovel the driveway so his family could get out to work and school in time.
Love is the little things. It’s not click-bait.
Have you ever noticed how little click-bait delivers? After finding out what kind of cheese represents your cat, or those six tips to a better life, do you really feel fulfilled?
In the same way, when love is flashy and showy it often means that the love is futile and shallow. You come away feeling unfulfilled.
Now, imagine getting a note, sent to you from a friend, that tells you your strengths, and qualities they admire. That is something that shows deep love. It also is not flashy. No one is asking them to write that note, and it’s up to you whether or not they even get recognized for it.
I’ll say it again – love is in the little things.
One More Lesson
The other realization of my time cleaning the bathroom sink was the why behind my love for her. Of course, there are a lot of reasons, but the primary one is that I love her for everything that she’s done for me. Not only does my mom make dinner, she sets up for it, and often does the dishes after. She’s our advisor, our support and always has an ear to hear what we have to say, even when we don’t know what we’re saying.
In short, I love her because she loved me first. I do little things for her because she’s done the little things for me.
In case you can’t see the parallel, I’ll spell it out for you. 1 John 4:19 says, “We love him [God] because he first loved us.”
In the Bible, there’s an idea of common grace – it basically means that God gives all of us (Christians or not) air to breath, life to live, and all the simple pleasures of this world; the sense of taste and smell, sunrises and sunsets, the feel of the sun on your face and all the rest.
Yes, God’s love is clearly seen in the wonderful work of Christ on the cross, taking the place of our punishment and allowing us to enter into Heaven. But it is also in the little things – all those wonderful experiences that God lets us enjoy.
Love isn’t click-bait articles.
Love is the little things.
(You can listen to “Wake Me Up” by Avicii here – Lyric Video)