At the beginning of 2023 I sent out the following invitation to rest. Now, more than ever, I am convinced of the mysterious power of love received to to transform us. And I believe that you can only love to the extent that you know you are loved.
Last Saturday morning, we attended a prayer meeting concluding ten days of prayer organized to ring in the new year with hope and spiritual purpose.
During the evenings leading up to this final gathering, people had scribbled prayer requests onto squares of paper and stuffed them into a wooden box at the front of the church. Before taking these petitions outside to burn them in symbolic release to God, we gathered one last time.
Songs, thanksgiving, and prayer requests anchored fragments of theological discussion in response to selected readings.
Towards the end of one particular theological exchange, a devout Christian woman, mother of two grown children, raised her hand.
“How can I love better?”
She continued: “I read my Bible every day, I pray... but I still don’t love well.”
She did not cry, nor did she sound desperate. Just tired and sad.
After more discussion, we filed outside, organizing ourselves in a circle around a metal waste paper basket where Mayra, our leader, lit a handful of papers on the surface with a butane lighter.
Someone began to sing and we all joined in:
“Cuando el pueblo de Dios ora, suceden cosas…”
A brisk, chilling wind threatened the tiny flame and Mayra bent over to shield it, jiggling the papers to keep the fire going.
The sun sparkled brilliant in a sea of bright blue, lying to us about the temperature. Naked branches reached towards us from dormant trees lining the parking lot, telling the truth about winter.
Another puff of wind caught the edge of my poncho and I pulled it tight, swaddling myself in defiance to the cold reality.
We drew closer to the struggling flame with the hope that, truly:
“When God’s people pray, things happen.”
Does the dissonance between your good beliefs and your not good behavior ever cause you to doubt? Or feel discouraged?
Has anyone ever told you that if you just loved God, everything would come together--it would be easy because (and here is the very tired illustration), when you love somebody, you naturally want to make them happy?
(I cannot even count how many times I’ve heard variations on that theme).
But how do you make yourself love someone?
Love has to be more than just a decision, more than just doing the right thing.
Did you ever learn that memory verse song from 1 John 4:7-8?
“Beloved, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
That could make us feel even worse, unless we look at it as a diagnostic tool that points us in a more hopeful direction, a place where God is waiting to answer that prayer we have to “love better”.
Maybe we don’t know God.
Maybe we don’t know that God is love.
Maybe we don’t know that God loves us before we love him.
Because John keeps writing, and in that same letter, he says this truth:
“We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19)
You have to know that John was so sure about his beloved status that referred to himself as “the disciple that Jesus loved” in his account of Jesus’ ministry (John 13:23).
He got it.
We don’t need peer reviewed journal articles or complex theological treatise to prove that loving comes easier when we know we’re loved.
So maybe we can rest from the whole “loving better” burden and, instead, pray:
“Help me to receive love.”
And perhaps one actionable step in that direction might be to notice love in the world around us, to notice the way love enters our moments and to reach out and take it into our hearts with thanks.
What are some ways that love hovers near you?
In the laughter of someone listening to your funny story?
The attention of someone who holds your disappointment?
A compliment that demonstrates you are seen and appreciated?
An expected or unexpected text, card, or gift?
The adoration of a pet?
Beauty that tugs at your heart in ways hard to explain (artfully arranged food, flowers, stars, waterfalls, birds...)?
A meal shared in good company?
A circle of people, resisting the cold to share their hopes and desires with each other and with God?
Perhaps if we turn our hearts to notice the love that lies in so many ordinary things of life, we will create openess in our hearts to hold the good head knowlege that God is love and that he loves us... even while we aren’t loving.
May the burden of our failings fall away and may we rest in Love--right where we are.