And the Greatest of These, Pt. 2

I didn't intend to make my thoughts on the love of God into a series, but maybe I will. It does seem to be something God is working in me during this season. There may be no continuous thought or idea in the posts other than what God is showing me about love. Here's the link to the first one. 

When one of our church deacons held his new daughter, and her almond-eyes looked back at him as he introduced her to the congregation, his voice trembled joy and her face shined peace and my heart filled.

In my stubbornness, only a few hours earlier I had muttered a prayer for the Sunday service, asking God in early-morning lack to bring me some well-deserved happiness, thank you very much, after a few days of tears.

Then there was talk about the Prodigal, and I remember his story. About the prostitutes and the pig slop, about how when he came back he didn't ask for happiness; but rather for the role of even a servant if it allowed him to return to his Father's house.

And how the Father didn't run toward a servant, but a son; and didn't give him happiness as much as hope.

More talk followed about understanding what God did for us. Understanding in a way that leaves us changed. Maybe hearing His own voice tremble joy and His feet pound the earth as He runs toward us?

This kind of love is not for the understanding but for the trusting? Like the deacon's daughter, who is too young to understand the love that brought her across an ocean and two continents to be home, but maybe she can trust it.

Yahweh, the Prodigal-Lover, stands at the end of that road whispering healing-words that turn my heart toward Him long before my ears are wise enough to listen.

This, then, is largely my story. What I have to share with those who haven't heard the same healing in different words meant for their heart, only.

From the beginning nothing and no one has loved me as He does. When a love like this was spoken to me, a love that makes a king a willing fool in the eyes of others, that makes the prideful willing to be pitied, what could I do but trust and follow?

The only other option is becoming the worst version of myself. It is the choking grip of control, fear, perfectionism, and anger; and I write that last sentence from what I unfortunately know, not what I assume. As a wife, soon-to-be-mother, sister, daughter, friend and Christ-follower, I can scarce afford to not respond.

For me there is nothing else but to be loved.

And The Greatest of These

Love never gives up.

Love cares for others, more than self.

Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.

Love doesn't strut,

Doesn't have a swelled head,

Doesn't force itself on others,

Isn't always, "Me first,"

Doesn't fly off the handle,

Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn't revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. 

- 1 Corinthians 13 (The Message)

The fact that I used to read this passage as if I had it figured out leaves me speechless. Years I spent, bumbling around with the love of God, trying to apply it to my life and the lives of others in a severely inadequate way.

I could blame my lack of affect on those around me. I was hurt! There are scars! I couldn't love them! While the pain was real and the scars show it, maybe what was more to my detriment was thinking I could understand, fully, how to handle His love.

As if, really, I could get my hands around the deep.

I see now it is not for me to be a master of God's heart as much as I'm to be a channel for it. And wasn't this Christ's ultimate example? Only God, Himself, could show us how to be perfect channels of such a powerful force.

Arms up, head tilted back, and eyes shut. Couldn't this ... the receiving posture of worship ... be an echo of the posture of the Cross? Receiving the deep, the lasting, the dangerous, the redeeming love of the Father; carried perfectly through the Son; and rushed into the hearts of man by the Holy Spirit.

Now I read that passage and I am filled with a holy trepidation. Knowing how little I understand of the love of God, how much I need to grow in reveling in it; and how I cannot communicate what I have not experienced, and what does it mean when I see a lack of love-fruit in the lives of those around me?

And I can be rest assured that love does leave fruit. It does not leave people unchanged. There are signs when love is present, and signs too when love is absent.

May my life show the abundance? May I not forget the road of channel-love is a hard one, well worn by the feet of martyrs and murderers, of housewives and harlots?

May I keep my heart open? Never closed in deceptive self-protection. May I not attempt to hoard this love like day-old manna, and let it harden and grow stale inside me?

"There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give it to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell."
- C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

And Away We Go

My husband and I will be married for six months on Friday. We will also be celebrating our launch into full-time ministry this weekend.

With two semi-big milestones coming up I decided to (finally) get around to creating a blog.

Why? Because I think that there's a lot to write down when you're experiencing a new marriage and a new career; and if I'm ever going to get any better at writing I might as well begin practicing it and see what people think.

My husband doesn't believe in blogs.

I tried to politely explain to him that, unlike his preconceived notions, not all blogs were random entries of poorly written emotional vomit that people have no business displaying to the public - especially the internet.

"There's a high culture to the blog world," I said. "A lot of well-known and well-respected authors keep blogs."

His response:

"Well just because a super-model goes to the bathroom every once in awhile doesn't mean people want to see it."

Touche.

Now - my husband doesn't really pay attention to American culture. (I spent most of high school reading People and Us while he was reading the desert fathers.) So it surprised me that he used super-models as an example.

He was a philosophy major in college, though, and I couldn't really deny his logic.

As different as my husband and I are in many areas, we are very similar in others. The biggest being our passion for truth.

It is because of this that we will be working in college ministry over the next several years.

I can think of no other environment where truth is called into question and redefined more than on college campuses, by professors and students alike.

Our hearts are to point people toward what is true - toward the Truth, specifically; and to do so in love. Because with truth there is freedom & vision, which yields life.

We also know that wielding truth without grace does no good.

Hence the blog title.

So this will be a place where I write about the truth I learn in marriage, in ministry, and in life. Hope you enjoy!

p.s. There will also be many pictures because certain parts of me haven't matured past elementary - mainly the one that finds things easier to read with pictures. I find it easier to write if I use pictures as well.