It is REALLY hard to write the introduction to a [relatively short] Bible study on love. I am doing edits now and went back to this today. I’d love to know your thoughts. What do you hear people say about love? What do you think about some of these internet discoveries I made regarding the contemporary understanding of love? Please love me by giving me your thoughts:-)!
Love.
Philosophers, poets, moviemakers, and ordinary people have searched to understand and explain love since the beginning of time. A Google search on “studies of love 2012” reveals that the contemporary world thinks of love almost exclusively in terms of romantic or sexual love, although some studies focus on the brain’s response to a mother’s love or supportive relationships. Following current evolutionary science, it is popular to talk about love as a “primitive human instinct.” One MIT professor has determined that romantic love is best understood in the context of economic resources.
In the midst of such cultural conversation, we must ask, to quote Shakespeare out of context, “Is there an ‘ever-fixed mark’ of love?” Is it possible to understand love, and more importantly, is it possible to live love in a world seemingly desperate for it?
The Apostle Paul says it is not only possible; it is essential. In 1 Corinthians 13, often called the “love chapter,” Paul chides the Corinthians for their lack of love by laying out a long description. Paul begins with what would have seemed a bold claim: “without love, I am nothing” (v.2) and concludes with a confident assertion, “Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love” (v.13, NIV). Sandwiched in between these two statements is a long definition of love in about fourteen parts, depending on how you count. Every time I hear this passage read at a wedding, I wonder if the couple truly believes they will love like this (I know I did!). I’m lost at love with the requirements of “patient and kind” (v. 4), but I’m guessing everyone would admit they sometimes “insist on [their] own way” (v.5) And as nice as it sounds to say love “bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, and endure all things,” (I Cor.13:7), who can really do this?
There is only one answer, the subject of our study and object of our worship – God. God can love like this, does love like this, and amazingly, empowers us by his grace to love like this. Indeed, without love we are nothing, but with God’s love, as we shall see in this study, we become something.
Archive of ‘writing’ category
Yesterday, I enjoyed the odd (for me) privilege of sharing communion with two different bodies. The first was with my mom in a large Episcopal cathedral with all of the eloquence and majesty you might expect. (It also happened to be the church where almost 30 years ago My husband and I were married.) Later, I joined our two sons at the church we were members of even before our eldest was born. We’ve since moved to a different state, but he has just returned to live and work. Anyway (I discovered there is more here than I actually knew, which is one of the great perks of writing – hint, hint…). It made me think of a long ago discussion I had with Pastor Scotty Smith about re-membering. I’ll post the summary, and let me know if any of this makes you remember anything or re-member anyone!
When we remember, we also re-member. When we remember that redemption accomplished reconciliation for us, we rest in that reconciliation and we live toward reconciliation with friends and enemies. We remember that one day we will re-member with every tribe, tongue, nation, and people group for an eternal story of kingdom worship, and we work (yes, this is at least part of the ‘working out of salvation’ Philippians refers to) toward building that community now.
In remembrance we rest, and in remembrance we do. Because we remember what Christ has done for us, we drink his body and eat his blood. We do so to remember that we can rest from our labors to be acceptable in God’s sight. And in resting from our labors to be acceptable in his sight, we are freed to labor and love for the sake of spreading the good news of this kingdom to others. Wherever you are re-membering, do this in remembrance of the Lord our Savior, Jesus Christ.
Am I the only one who missed the San Diego ‘Fireworks Bust’? What words would you use to describe this? Mine are ‘stunning,’ ‘apocalyptic,’ ‘Oh, shoooooooo-tt. Your fireworks went blast.”
Wanta write? Tell a story to entertain youngsters. (Yes, you will need to hide all technical devices and perhaps offer anti-anxiety meds to get them to sit still and listen.) I never knew before the story of the creation of Alice in Wonderland.
Finally, for those who caught the the quote from Spurgeon’s fascinating sermon on Matthew 26, and Jesus’ anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane and want to take 15 (longer if you stop to think about it:-) to read the whole thing, “The Garden of the Soul”
One of the hazards of blogs for readers is that we stop reading full stories of any kind. So today I’m sharing just two Friday Faves; both are short stories.
The first, called “Dos Palabras,” by Isabel Allende, is a delightful Latin American literary piece about the transformational power of words. I had to read it for Spanish class this week, but I leaned heavily in the English translation. I’m including links to both versions, because I’m pretty sure the Spanish version is better:-).
Dos Palabras
The second story is a Raymond Carver classic, a redemption story about tragedy, hatred, reconciliation and love. (A caution – some strong language used for literary purposes.)
A Small Good Thing
Why not take twenty to thirty minutes to read some good literature today? If you do, please post comments on what you thought of the story or stories. The only thing better than reading is sharing our responses to it. To share comments on the Living Story Facebook page, click
Alert listeners at this past weekend’s Gospel Coalition Conference for Women may have noticed that both Tim Keller and John Piper quoted a woman named Virginia Stem Owens. I don’t know how many poor souls like myself have somehow missed this writer and teacher extraordinaire along the way, but I am happy to share a gem I discovered in the treasure trove of her blog. Here she is writing about the human need to tell story…
“Say you go on a trip – an Alaskan cruise or a visit to a previously estranged relative. If you return and no one asks you to tell them about it, don’t you feel that the experience was somehow incomplete? If no one listens to the tale of our travels or trials, we feel a little, sometimes a lot, frustrated. The human race seems to have a deep seated need to narrate our lives to one another.
Again, why?
Because, I believe, we have an inborn need to give a shape to our lives instead of experiencing life as only a jumble of sensations — just one darn thing after another, a string of unrelated occurrences. We do this by identifying ups and downs, what was good and what was bad about the day or trip or lifetime. We want to figure out what caused certain actions. Did we get fired because we were incompetent or because the boss was paranoid? Was the high score on the history test a result of hard study or pure luck?”
And as we shape our story, we shape ourselves. We come to know, or at least think we know, ourselves. We all live inside some story. We have to. What, we want to know, does it all mean? And somehow we have settled on stories as the best tool with which to make meaning of our lives.” Virginia Stem Owens in Remembering Your Life at Virginia Stem Owens blog
