What Is Love?

I wrote this last weekend, which was ironically Valentines Day Weekend. I spent the weekend in Memphis, TN just hanging out with some friends from school and enjoying the sights and sounds of Beale Street and Downtown Memphis. Here are some thoughts I had over the weekend...

Last night, I went and saw the movie Seven Pounds with some friends. I was really impressed with the movie and it really made me do a lot of thinking about what love really is. Overall it was a great movie but was very sad at the same time. Now I’m not trying to spoil the movie for those of you that haven’t seen it, but I found myself intrigued by Will Smith’s character. His character was a man who had felt pain after something had happened to him after he had just been engaged. Because his character felt this pain, he thought it was his duty to change the lives of others that were experiencing life changing pain as well. Over the course of the movie Smith’s character does random acts of kindness and love to those who are truly in need. By doing these random acts of love for those who need it, he in turn got to show people love through his actions and have a very serious impact on those he showed these random acts of kindness and love to. The thing is, the people he did this for were complete strangers. He didn’t know these people at all. All he knew is that they were hurting like he was and if he was given the opportunity to alter their circumstances he was definitely going to.

One of the things that really stuck out to me was the fact the Smith’s character showed unconditional love to the people he helped. These people were complete strangers yet he showed this unconditional love. This unconditional love is something that our God has for us. And it’s just that, it’s a love that God has for us that needs no conditions to be met. God just has it for us and loves us anyway. One thing I just can’t shake after seeing this movie is the fact that Will Smith’s character had this crazy unconditional love for complete strangers. While we are not complete strangers to God, He still has this unconditional love for us each and everyday no matter where we go that is towards or away from God. God loves us the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. The really ironic part of this is that I just happened to go see this movie on Valentines Day. Weird huh? I think maybe God was trying to tell me something and as I thought about it, I felt like writing. So these are some thoughts that were stirred up in my heart after watching this movie. I didn’t want to ruin it too much, but I strongly urge all of you to go and see this movie. The ending is very good and has a solid gospel message to it. Anyways that’s all for now. Hope you all enjoy these thoughts I’ve shared and that they challenge you.

<><
~Matt

P.S.
The fact that Hollywood of all places portrays this in one of their movies is very rare these days and I was pleasantly surprised to see it last night.