Love is a Burnin’ Thing

   
Set me as a seal upon your heart, As a seal upon your arm; 
For love is as strong as death, Jealousy as cruel as the grave;

Its flames are flames of fire, A most vehement flame.      Song of Solomon 8:6

We may never know what love in its purest form looks like until the day we meet Jesus face to face. It has been distorted since the beginning of time. In the beginning, the love between man and God was so pure that they walked together in the garden in the cool of the evening. The love Adam and Eve felt for one another was surely reflective of the love God held for mankind: sacrificial, unconditional, yearning. 

Since that day, love has become so twisted that true love is rarely seen. The purest love I can imagine is the love a mother has for her child, yet that love pales by comparison. The love that God has for you and I is “inutterable,” inconceivable, and like a fire. 

Christian mystic St. Catherine of Siena described the love of God in this manner:

“When then, eternal Father, did you create this creature of yours?…You show me that you made us for one reason only: in your light you saw yourself compelled by the fire of your love to give us being in spite of the evil we would commit against you, eternal Father. It was fire, then, that compelled you. Oh, unutterable love, even though you saw all the evils your creatures would commit against your infinite goodness, you acted as if you did not see and set your eye on the beauty of your creature, with whom you had fallen in love like one drunk and crazy with love…You are the fire, nothing but a fire of love, crazy over what you have made.”

God’s love is a burnin’ thing.