Lessons From the "Love Bug"

Lessons From the "Love Bug"
by Bud Malmsten

The Word and Phrase Thieves are at it again! These are the ones who take wonderful words and assign new meanings or suspicions to them. There is a natural process by which words grow with the culture; that is not what I mean. I am talking about the highway robbery that consciously takes a perfectly good word and makes it unusable for is former purposes.

Perhaps in another column we will mourn lost meanings, but for this time one example will make the point. Think about the word, "gay." However let us not get sidetracked here.

This time they have attempted to steal one of the most precious expressions in our language. Oh, I know that was not the intention. It is possible they were simply experimenting with their computers to see how far they could go with a program.

I am sure the conspiracy folks have already written the movie scripts detailing the sinister plot behind all this hubbub. And they might be right!

You can read in other places about the vast problems caused, the irreplaceable files lost, and the huge costs of repairs resulting from "The Love Bug." My biggest problem that day was that my computer would not send my column to Chris Burlingame in time to get it posted in the regular issue. It was a few days later that I figured that out.

My concern about the Love Bug incident focuses in a different place. Is there anything we can learn about life from this bizarre phenomenon? ABSOLUTELY! Here are a few things, not necessarily in order of importance.

NOT EVERYONE WHO SAYS, "I LOVE YOU," LOVES YOU. You don't need to look to history or anywhere else to find examples of that. If you look deeply enough into your own heart, you might even dredge up a time or two when you have used that old ploy for your own purposes.

So how can you know? I cannot give you any help in protecting your computer from Love Bugs, or any other problems. But this glitch came disguised as a message of love, and that is a wake-up call for regular people. [Watch out for a huge jump here.]

Did you know that God is the one who invented the concept of love? Did you also know that He takes that concept very seriously? So seriously that He gave our species a perfect example of what love really is. In the last few weeks we have observed that most significant celebration in Christian circles, the remembrance of Jesus, his life, crucifixion, and resurrection.

Why did he do that? To demonstrate the absolute love of God for the human race - including you!

I hope you checked out the CBS mini-series, "JESUS." If not, you can read about it in the book - you know, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.

So, how can you recognize the real thing? Here is the finest definition I have yet found:

"Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut,
Doesn't have a swelled head,
Doesn't force itself on others,
Isn't always "me first,"
Doesn't fly off the handle,
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn't revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best,
Never looks back, But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies.

[From "THE MESSAGE, the New Testament in Contemporary Language" translatedby Eugene H Peterson.NavPress Publishing Group, Colorado Springs, Colorado 80935]

Note the contrast between God and the Love Bug. When God says, "I love you," He means what He says. The Love bug came to destroy - sneaked in with deceptive words.

The Love bug depended on people believing a lie.

God's only message is Truth "I Love YOU!"

So here is one more lesson from the Love Bug:

IT IS IMPORTANT TO KNOW WHO IS SAYING, "I LOVE YOU."