“I know people do a lot to help me, but I just want someone to be my friend.” So said a single mother in my congregation.
Tim goes on to talk about how sometimes we can serve people and try to meet their needs but do not actually connect relationally with them. We try to fix their problems without loving them. Maybe in our western culture we try so often to fix the ills that we see around us that we forget that the thing that others need is to be loved. It reminds me much of 1 Corinthians 13 particularly verse 3:
"If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing."
There is a part of me that wants to blame the English language for only having one word to describe love. The issue though is more one of the human heart.
In our culture and society we no longer really know what love is and the word ‘love’ has become in most cases sexual. Sex is an expression of love and intimacy between a husband and a wife but love is not exclusively defined by a sexual relationship. This is a misrepresentation of the word. I love my housemates, I love my soccer team mates (Go Gumbies!!), I love the youth group kids I lead, I love both my brothers and sisters in Christ, I love my family. Guys need to say to other guys that they love each other without freaking out. So what is love:
"Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends."This is what is important more than fixing their problems.
As I finish off here I know that the most important thing is not saying it but actually living it in our lives. I need to be more patient and kind with my housemates, I need to be less irritable when I play badly, I need to rejoice more in the growth in my Youth Group guys, I need to not be arrogant or envious with my brothers and sisters in Christ, and I need to not insist my own way with my parents.
Let’s reclaim the word love.
Resurgence is
“Resurgence is a movement that resources multiple generations to live for Jesus so that they can effectively reach their cities with the gospel by staying culturally accessible and Biblically faithful.”
I read recently in a book (from a non-Christian's perspective) that when people go to church what they often find is a whole bunch of really nice people. In a way that is good, being nice is certainly a good thing... although if this is the extent of our relationships we're in a bit of strife. If I only wanted someone nice to talk to I'd go to Woolies and chat with that really lovely middle aged lady at the check-out. Love is so much more than being nice. I think that sometimes there is a very real temptation to go to church and have several really 'nice' conversations with people, only to go home feeling all warm and fuzzy because we're such nice people. Love runs deeper than this... love requires us to give of ourselves, to put the needs of others first. We have been shown love in abundance by our awesome Father, and therefore have every reason to take joy in showing love to others.
ReplyDeleteRock on Gumbies!! :)
I wonder what loving a stranger (like the single mother) looks like. Many would first suggest maybe babysitting one night so she can have time off, or offering to drive kids somewhere, or baking a meal, or giving the kids hand-me-downs, but that sounds like the stuff that is already being done for her.
ReplyDeleteI don't know, it just sounded like your post suggested that wasn't love, per se. Or perhaps those actions can be done both as a result of love, or not.
But then this calls into question, again, the meaning of love. Instead of perhaps 'reclaiming' love, it ambiguates (is that a word?) it further. (I really don't think that's a word, but it will suffice).
I don't know what 'reclaiming' the word love would look like. Obviously we love God differently to how we love our parents, our spouses, or strangers. But isn't love still an appropriate word for all of those?
I think you're right in saying the issue largely stems from the fact English only has one word for Love. I'm betting the Hebrew word used for loving strangers would be different to the word used for loving siblings, and different again to the word used for loving God.
Maybe we don't need to reclaim the word 'love' so much as make sure we simply enact it.
(Sorry, that was a lot of disjointed thoughts as they occurred to me. I had no particular goal in mind so I didn't bother trying to form them into any cohesive paragraph :P).
sorry, yes, I'm back again.
ReplyDeleteAnd then, another thought altogether- can we do something for someone as a result of loving God but not the person? My instinct tells me 'no', that Jesus once said something about loving him *by* loving others, or something like that. But, say there was someone you really didn't particularly love or anything, but you did something (willingly) for them because you love God and knew God would want you to do that... is that loving God without loving the person? Or is that loving them too? Or is it not loving either of them but doing something out of duty? But can duty not be love, too?
You started it :P