Some things don't ever change. Today many of you reading this article probably have a tremendous crush on someone of the opposite sex. You may admire their good looks, you may appreciate their sensitivity, you may like the way they dress or cut their hair, perhaps this person shares your love of music. And in the throes of fluttering stomachs and the chaos of a heart that pumps purple peanut butter, you may be asking yourself, "Do I love this person?"

Surely an intense emotional preoccupation with that person suggests that you do love them. Or does it? The feeling of passion, even sexual passion, is a natural God-given part of who we are as humans. However, stalkers are preoccupied with people. Do stalkers actually "love" the person they stalk? Not usually. Infatuations can turn harmful to oneself or the person on whom we turn our affections.

As Christians we have an obligation to submit our intense passions to God (Please note that I said submit and not deny). We also have a guide to sort out infatuation from true love: The Scriptures. Romance is not beyond the jurisdiction of God's word which has been given to us as a guide for matters such as this. Scripture is a sure and immediate guide by which to sort out infatuation from love and goes further than that by teaching us how to love all people, even boyfriends and girlfriends and those distant figures we dream of. Why not start with "Love your neighbor as you love yourself"? This commandment first appears in Leviticus 19 and is later reiterated by Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew, and is second only to the commandment to love God above all and with every single shred of our being.

When we experience "falling in love" we often think of how this person affects us, or the pleasure we would feel if they would notice us. We also know that certain people are desirable for upping our social status. If we date the Babe of Babes others will think we're cool. We think our being is better authenticated this way. Oh sure, we write love poems, send flowers, write notes of adoration, buy dinners and movies, even go the prom and yaddha, yaddha, yaddha. Doing these things, we think, demonstrates how much we love the other person. Right? Hopefully.

There is still a risk that we do the above activities just because our culture tells us that we ought to do. We may even do these things in order to obligate the other person to us. We are clutching them for the sake of fulfilling the popular mandate which says that unless you're attached, you're pretty much a nothing.

Biblical love demands that we treat our dates and dream-companions the way we want to be treated. Do you like it when people are interested in you? Then become a person who asks good questions and pays attention to conversation. Do you want someone to give you gifts only to find out you owe them something in return? Then don't give gifts, poems, notes, or dedicate songs only to pressure a person into returning your affection. So if you do this stuff not because it is just the way things are suppost to be. But if you do it all because you care for this person so much. Then that is a good sign it is love.

We always need to question our motives because if nothing else we know we are all sinners. We have a way of botching good things, like romance, and turning them towards evil ends.

Infatuation is powerful. Unchecked and unguided by a loyalty towards Christ, infatuation easily becomes a counterfeit love deluding those under its power--and we've all been there. Infatuation is a mood, a fluctuating flight of fancy which can be easily tattered and bashed by the realities of relational difficulties. When things don't go smoothly with the person who has induced the mood, or we discover they are humanly fallible, the mood is disturbed and we may look to another person to become the source of our mood. This is exactly why so many people jump from relationship to relationship, or in the adult world from marriage to marriage. They find it easier and more pleasurable to start over with a new mood than they do to engage people with love. Love is more enduring than mood and soberly considers the other person with dignity and respect. That is, love has an eternal perspective and often asks the question, "How is the way I'm relating to the person I like/love improving or destroying their walk with God?"

In as much as love takes an eternal perspective infatuation takes a delusional preference for the immediate. In as much as infatuation is a mood, love is a verb. Infatuation sits on its behind just feeling the groovy "love vibes" while love acts and moves with an intention to do good. None of this is to say infatuation is bad. Its natural, its good. But infatuation must be framed within the eternal perspective of love. Not only "feel" a certain way but also "do" a certain way.

This love is the sort of love God has demonstrated for us. He has not waited on a mood of infatuation to redeem us from sin. Praise him for that! We'd all be in big trouble if that were the case. God actively seeks us out to reconcile us to himself, even while we are big jerks and selfish pigs. Who are we to not love our neighbor as we love ourselves? Who are we to not think of our boyfriends, girlfriends, dates, and dream companions as our neighbors whom deserve that love based on a command from the mouth of God?

If you want to know what infatuation is, it is a mood. You're probably feeling it towards someone right now. Fine. That's life. Just be careful to frame that mood within true, eternal-minded love instructed by love for Christ and the wisdom of the Scriptures.

I leave you with that famous love passage from I Corinthians 13.