01-22-2014
“There is no
fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with
punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. We love because he first loved us.” (1 John 4: 18-19 NRSV)
Now that I
have many of you bobbing your heads to the side as you are reading this (admit
it, if you were an SNL fan in the 90s you were at least tempted to bounce your
head a little), I wanted to take a moment to share a few thoughts I have had
lately regarding an ancient and continuing problem within the human
condition... the problem of "love".
I have often
seen social media posts and quotes that say things like “I’ve given up on
wasting time worrying about people who don’t like me” or “I’m only going to
expend energy loving the people who love me.”
(I’m paraphrasing here of course.)
And while I understand the underlying principle, I have to say I
disagree with the idea that Love is a transaction. That doesn’t mean that I advocate staying in
abusive relationships, nor do I encourage being taken advantage of as a
standard operating procedure (that isn't a very loving expression on the part
of others either). But I find that if we
treat love as a commodity to be counted, countered, withheld, traded, or
accumulated, we take away its immeasurable quality and value.
At any given
point in time as parents, our children DO NOT always expend a lot of energy
expressing “love” for us. (In fact,
sometimes it’s exactly the opposite.).
Do we withhold our love from them or cut them off? Our spouses may not always “like us” in the
course of our lives together in marriage… is it a waste of time worrying about
them? Friends and relations move into
and out of our lives as a matter of natural growth and change. It may not be a function of anything other
than circumstance, but do we stop caring for them because they are not in our
immediate daily living at this time?
Love - pure
love - is given for no other reason than the giver enjoys the benefits given to
the one who is its object. Balance and
peace inside of relationships are the products of giving without regard for
what we get back. This includes our
relationship with God. A mercenary heart
cannot experience this kind of love because it is more interested in what it
will get out of the arrangement.
God gains
nothing from us, yet continues to love us.
Perfectly complete in every way, God needs nothing from us, but
continues to woo us… continues to bless us and gift us… continues to give
forgiveness we cannot earn nor will ever deserve. And it is only because of that Love that the
human heart becomes pure enough that it can both experience and give something
this priceless. God has never loved us
because we are good; God makes us good because we are loved. We are transformed by Love, and others can be
transformed by our love for them. But
love only has true value if it is given as a gift, not offered as a business
deal.
What do I
mean by that? Well, it isn't love that
breaks our hearts... it's the absence or removal of love that does that. When we give love only because we want
someone to "return the favor" it sets us up for disappointment and pain. We will always be disappointed by "quid
pro quo" relationships. BUT, if we
can learn to love in a way that sets no expectation, and if others love us in
this way, it frees us to simply enjoy the people with which we share it. For the record, this doesn't mean that
anything goes... just that we can love in spite of frailties and faults; and
that we understand that people who are imperfect, just like we are, will
sometimes fall. Love means that we help
them get back up when they do, and they do the same for us. Perfect love sometimes says "I love you
just the way you are, AND I love you too much to leave you in that kind of pain
and anguish. Let's move forward
together."
We are not
yet perfect, but in each act of love shown we become more so. In each practice of loving kindness we come
closer and closer to perfection. In each
moment of Christian fellowship and unity born from a desire for others’
restored and strengthened relationship with God in love, we see perfection
manifested in our hearts and in our world.
Receiving love of this magnitude fills us with a desire to be as good as
the love makes us feel we already
are... to be as good as it tells us we are to the Giver. Giving it can do the
same. It shifts our reality, and makes
us see everything around us differently.
Or to quote again from 1 John 4, “… if we love one another, God lives in
us, and his love is perfected in us.” (v. 12b NRSV)
In this,
love is not a problem, but is instead the strength, courage, comfort, and
contentment that God (who IS love the scriptures tell us) shows it to be. Love ceases to be a problem... and becomes
the solution to every problem. May the
inestimable power of the Holy Spirit create in your heart a perfect and Holy love
that keeps you, and those who are gathered around you, today and every day!
Love in
Christ,
Chris
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