Love Gone Bad: Demi Moore's Sad Downward Spiral
I’m really not lovable. A top recent celebrity news is that Demi Moore was hospitalized for inhaling laughing gas on Jan 23. Reports of her being depressed, not eating, losing weight, began surfacing since she announced her intention to divorce her husband Asthon Kutcher because of his infidelity after 6 years of marriage. She is 49. He is 34. After their separation she said, “What scares me is that I’m going to ultimately find out at the end of my life that I’m really not lovable, that I’m not worthy of being loved. That there’s something fundamentally wrong with me.” What sad words! She echoes correctly that man is sinful (Rom 3:10-12,23). But she does not know of a love that is greater than all our sins.
Ghost. The various accounts of what happened to her was all over the news and on Night Line. It caught my attention, because my wife and I loved the romantic movie “Ghost” (1990) that she starred in, and which made her famous. When she confessed her love to Patrick Swayze, he responded by saying, “Ditto.” Ever since then, it became one of our favorite lines that we say to each other. (Of course, our 4 kids think that it is totally weird when their aging parents say such awkward things to each other!)
Can’t buy me love. What is sad about Moore’s story is that her life has mirrored a similar destructive pattern of many sad celebrities (Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Charlie Sheen, etc.). Their sad lives, despite the adoration of millions, reveals the truth that fame, popularity, clout, money, and unlimited access to life’s luxuries and pleasures cannot buy any man happiness, not to mention love.
Addicted to being loved. It is true that all humans want and need to be loved, since God made us to love God (Dt 6:5), to love others (Lev 19:18), and to be loved by God (Jer 31:3; 1 Jn 4:19). But when you become a celebrity, love is constantly being heaped on you that it becomes a “drug” you cannot live without. Being adored (worshipped) by the multitudes is like a drug high, according to the confession of rock stars. The reason many literally take drugs is that after the concert, they cannot maintain the high of a concert with thousands of screaming fans. To a similar or lesser degree, this perhaps applies to all celebrities, even to all human beings.
Only God’s love satisfies our soul. Demi Moore’s life apparently unraveled because her cute and younger husband stopped loving her. Now she wonders if she is even lovable. Only God’s love satisfies our soul. Augustine wrote in his Confessions, “God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you.” The Psalmist said, “My soul finds rest in God alone” (Ps 62:1).
May God give us love and rest through his Son, and minister to others to find the same.
“Ghost” is an all-time favorite of my wife and I also! It really is true that our soul finds rest only in God our Savior. Another Psalm expresses my soul condition these days. I used to want to be with God, now my soul “pants for God”! Without the love and grace of Jesus, we are lost in the sea of this world, even if we are a celebrity or have much money and power.
Psalm 42:1-6 “1 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” 4 These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng. 5 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and 6 my God. My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon–from Mount Mizar.”
Dr. Ben — I really love how you relate “Hollywood” news to the gospel. :)
I think the sad part is most women these days feel better about themselves when they know their husbands love/adore them. I know for me, when my hubs is caring and thoughtful, I feel happy and even empowered. But when he’s insensitive/selfish, I just feel like my life is going down the drain. It’s quite an emotional and even sad roller coaster.
I know I have to put my hope in Jesus and Jesus’ love alone but I admit, I can understand how Demi feels. Women just want to know they are loved.
Thanks, Mary. I hear you. As a man and a husband I too want and need to be loved by my wife, even and maybe especially after 30 years of marriage. For instance, I get inwardly irritated whenever my wife falls asleep on the couch next to me when we are winding down by watching TV at night. I KNOW she is tired after working all day. But I FEEL as though she doesn’t bother to stay awake with me by enjoying our quality time together. Am I just not a whiny baby!
So, I always need to remind myself that through my wife, God has given me a foretaste of my final and ultimate reality, which is to be with Jesus forever when he appears. I know that this is the deepest longing of my soul. At the present time though, this side of heaven, God gives me many glimpses of his glory, the closest of which is likely my marriage and friendship with my wife.