“Love is a burning thing, and it makes a firey ring. Bound by wild desire, I fell into a ring of fire.”
The Johnny Cash song “Ring of Fire” has clicked with generations of people as they have experienced the surge of emotion attached to love and desire. We took a look at what it means to “burn with desire.” Listen.
“Love is a burning thing”… The emotions attached to love are utterly amazing. We forgo otherwise critical perspectives and see the world through rose colored glasses. The passion we burn with can fuel us to love beyond faults and fears, living selflessly. At the same time, the same passion if left unchecked can also become our destruction. It all is determined by the motivation behind our passion.
“Bound by wild desire”… A while back we looked at the difference between love and lust; love being rooted in a desire to give, while lust is rooted in a desire to get. Our desires then have to be weighed against the root of the feeling. Are we being self-focused or serve-focused?
In 1 John 2:15-17 we find that scripture tells us “Do not love the world or anything in the world”.. followed by three indicators that can influence us negatively: lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, the pride of life. These three “hooks’ into our human nature drag us from a focus on God and ‘true love’ to one twisted towards our own motivations.
In application we can ask ourselves a simple question: “How is this helping?” If our passion and desires are rooted in self they will only be looking out for our interests, not considering others. Our choice then must be one of re-centering our focus towards the right way to live, God’s Righteousness.
We can make the choice. “I choose to focus on righteousness.”
Don’t let desire burn you up, change your focus and live love towards others. #SummerOfLove
Blessings,
JB