{"id":38,"date":"2012-02-15T11:34:59","date_gmt":"2012-02-15T11:34:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/theroadyoureon\/?p=38"},"modified":"2012-02-15T11:40:24","modified_gmt":"2012-02-15T11:40:24","slug":"eternal-valentine%e2%80%99s-day-looking-for-god%e2%80%99s-love-in-all-the-wrong-places","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/theroadyoureon\/2012\/02\/eternal-valentine%e2%80%99s-day-looking-for-god%e2%80%99s-love-in-all-the-wrong-places.html","title":{"rendered":"Eternal Valentine\u2019s Day: Looking for God\u2019s Love in All the Wrong Places"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This week, we are celebrating Valentine\u2019s Day and continue to mourn Whitney Houston\u2019s death.<\/p>\n<p>She starred in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0117372\/\">The Preacher\u2019s Wife<\/a>, a forgettable movie with an unforgettable soundtrack including the song, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=FQGt6VNm_iQ\">I Believe in You and Me<\/a>,\u201d describing a superlative, eternal love.<\/p>\n<p>These aspirations seldom bear out, particularly among celebrities, for whom love is often more evanescent than eternal.<\/p>\n<p>Then there is agape \u2014 \u201cthe kind of love Christ taught and showed,\u201d as Peter Kreeft defined the term in explaining C.S. Lewis\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0156329301\">The Four Loves<\/a>.\u00a0 Agape transcends affection (Storge), friendship (Philia), and romantic love (Eros).<\/p>\n<p>With Agape, \u201cyou begin to be when you give yourself away,\u201d Kreeft <a href=\"http:\/\/www.peterkreeft.com\/topics\/love.htm\">explained<\/a>.\u00a0 By giving, \u201cyou mysteriously find yourself a recipient \u2014 of the very gift you gave away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Houston\u2019s tumultuous relationship with Bobby Brown starkly revealed the limitations of Eros to fill the God-shaped void we each have in our souls.<\/p>\n<p>Houston crooned about being \u201cin love eternally.\u201d\u00a0 Faith requires a personal relationship with a loving Creator and believing in the promise of Agape.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">And like the river finds the sea<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">I was lost, now I\u2019m free<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">Cuz I believe<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\">In you and me.<\/p>\n<p>People of faith know the experience of being lost and then found, imprisoned and then free.<\/p>\n<p>How do we try to free ourselves?\u00a0 Hollywood uses sex, alcohol, and drugs.\u00a0 Washington, D.C. uses excessive work \u2014 sometimes with a bit of Hollywood on the side.\u00a0 People everywhere use these and other numbing mechanisms in an attempt to free themselves.<\/p>\n<p>Houston sings, \u201cI will always let you in, boy \/ To places no one\u2019s ever been \/ Deep inside, can\u2019t you see?\u201d Agape lets us totally reveal ourselves: flaws, selfishness, bad decisions, pettiness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are fools for Christ\u2019s sake,\u201d St. Paul wrote, \u201cbut ye are wise in Christ.\u201d Echoing Paul\u2019s statement, Houston promised her beloved to \u201cplay the fool forever \/ Just to be with you forever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Though foolish to some, we too can sing, \u201cI am free,\u201d in the angelic heavenly choir in an eternal Valentine\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This week, we are celebrating Valentine\u2019s Day and continue to mourn Whitney Houston\u2019s death. She starred in The Preacher\u2019s Wife, a forgettable movie with an unforgettable soundtrack including the song, \u201cI Believe in You and Me,\u201d describing a superlative, eternal love. These aspirations seldom bear out, particularly among celebrities, for whom love is often more&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":448,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[24,8,14,23,22,21,20],"class_list":["post-38","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-agape","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-st-paul","tag-the-fpur-loves","tag-the-preachers-wife","tag-valentines-day","tag-whitney-houston"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Eternal Valentine\u2019s Day: Looking for God\u2019s Love in All the Wrong Places - The Road You&#039;re On<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/theroadyoureon\/2012\/02\/eternal-valentine\u2019s-day-looking-for-god\u2019s-love-in-all-the-wrong-places.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Eternal Valentine\u2019s Day: Looking for God\u2019s Love in All the Wrong Places - The Road You&#039;re On\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This week, we are celebrating Valentine\u2019s Day and continue to mourn Whitney Houston\u2019s death. 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