Love and Stained Glass

I remember some lines from the movie "American Wedding" which somehow made me think that the film wasn't as shallow as I thought it were.

"..you are the one woman I want to be with and the woman I can't be without. I love you."
and

"..Love isn't just a feeling. Love is something you do. It's a dress, a visit to band camp. A special haircut..."

These words stayed in my head long after the movie was over. Not that I haven't heard similar lines before but it kind of reminded me how similar I was to the lead character Jim. No, I didn't try to screw an apple pie nor did I give myself a "special haircut." Though I will plead guilty to being a pervert yet lacking the resolve to act on it. But let's not go there.

Like Jim, I had found the person whom I want to be with and surely can't be without. It doesn't take a genius to explain this feeling. You just feel great and complete when you're with someone you love and yet you feel your world is sad and empty when she's not there at your side. Some might argue that one and one make two and the term "better half" is just a romantic exaggeration of two people in love not surviving without the other. But I believe these things to be true. In this thing we call love there's no me and you, only us. You are in this together. Love is binding.

Which brings me to the second line: Love isn't just a feeling, it's something more than that. Loving someone doesn't only involve the butterflies you feel in your stomach when you're with this person, it also embraces your actions. It's always the little things that count; the one-minute phone call just to ask how she is, the three ice cubes you put in her drink, and the way you securely hold her arm or hand when you cross a busy road. "I LOVE YOU" doesn't end with the phrase itself because it is with "I LOVE YOU" that bigger and better things should start from.

To quote my future mother-in-law when asked what love meant to her she firmly answered, "Love is a decision." I thought about it and I guess she was right. Young lovers may not get to see the wisdom in what she has said, but I found perfect sense in it. When you love someone, you choose to love this person IN SPITE OF. You transcend and decide that she's truly the right one. And Like any decision, you should be ready to accept the consequences of the choice you had made. You must decide wholeheartedly and no one should decide but YOU.

In everything that you do put GOD first. Love is no exception. Ask God to guide you in finding the right person and it is by loving HIM first and above all that you are earnestly ready to love another. And when you do get to find that special someone, always ask God for help. The beauty of love cannot last without the will of God giving it that extra motivation. Even if you put much effort in a relationship, it will not last in God's absence. This can be likened to those brilliant stained glass art we see in Churches. They are nice to look at but we only see their magnificence when sunlight passes through their colored panes. We are the stained glass, God is the sunlight.