can't buy me love

Many waters cannot quench love,

neither can floods drown it.

If a man offered for love

all the wealth of his house,

he would be utterly despised.

Song of Solomon 8:7

So it appears that the Beatles were only echoing Solomon when they sang, "Can't Buy Me Love". Here at the end of the epic love song that Solomon penned romancing his Shulammite bride, he acknowledges both the power and the rare value of true love. It is a priceless part of human experience. It has a sustaining power unmatched by other human relational commitments. We are right to extol the joys of love and romance as we do as long as we are careful not to worship human love.

True love is an abiding, warm fire that cannot be easily extinguished. It is how I know love with my bride. It felt that way as we prepared to marry so long ago, and now, almost thirty years later that fire has not burned out. All it takes is some time with her to know the comforting warmth of love's blaze. Even when floods of tears and hard times have seemed to overwhelm us, the fire never dies. It burns on, lifted above the flood line by the grace God has given us to wholly commit holy to each other.

I can't place a value on that. Literally all I am and all I have in my life is tied to my precious wife. There is no way to describe what profoundly "is" for us. But I know what we are achieving. It is "oneness". It is what God made marriage between one man and one woman to be... two as one flesh. Those who know it are the wealthiest and strongest people they can be.