A flower in blossom

Sometimes I think we don't actually desire God quite as much as we think we do - or at least, I think co-existent with our desire to know Him and be near to Him is a desire to pull back, to withdraw, to refuse the vulnerability and surrender which necessarily come with knowing anyone intimately, but especially God. You can see the same push-and-pull of warring desires quite frequently in romantic relationships, to give a more accessible example: each person loves the other, and wants to trust and know (and be trusted and known by) the other, but there is an undercurrent of what can most simply be called fear that holds them back from fully letting go into mutual trust, vulnerability, knowing, and nearness. Each can be so desperate to earn and keep the other's love that they refuse to fully open themselves to the other (for fear of rejection), and as a result close themselves off to the love they most deeply crave. It is bitterly ironic that the direct consequence of the actions taken in search of love, in the striving to deserve love, is the construction of a barricade against the full force of that love when it finally comes.

And if it is such a bitter irony in the context of human relationships, is it not even more bitter when it occurs in the relationship between man and God? In a relationship with another person, the fallibility and imperfection of humanity can be used as a rationalization for the fear of vulnerability and genuine love, but with God that excuse falls short. The fear is exposed. Why do we hold back from the actions that would draw us nearer to God? Why is any flimsy excuse or distraction allowed to pull us away from our prayers or prevent us from meditating on Him throughout the day? It is not - it cannot be - that we fear He will reject us. If anything, our lack of devotion and piety would be greater reason for Him to reject us. More importantly, however, we know that His love is unfailing and enduring; we saw that He was willing even to suffer and die because of that love. No! - it is the love itself that we fear. It is too great, too high, too mighty; it is too far beyond our comprehension, and we fear it because its bounds are unknown - and, we have heard, unknowable.

A love without reason or end, a love that endures the scorn or indifference we show to it, a love that perseveres unchanging despite our fickle attention and attempts at returning it, a love that forgives, a love that knows us completely and does not let go, a love that is determined to hold on to us no matter how much we fight to be rid of it, a love that refuses to be angry no matter how we yell and storm and try to hurt it - that is the love God has for us, and that is the thing we fear most and yet most deeply desire and need. If we could but open ourselves up to it - open up our hearts not caring if it killed us with the strength and glory of its torrents - I think we would find that all the tense, angry, self-conscious, anxious striving in our hearts would be washed away, and that our souls would relax and unfold like the petals of a flower in blossom under the light of the sun.

Building love upon knowledge and joy upon truth

From The Practice of the Presence of God, by Brother Lawrence:

"That we ought to make a great difference between the acts of the understanding and those of the will: that the first were comparatively of little value, and the others, all. That our only business was to love and delight ourselves in God."

Note first that he does not say acts of the understanding are of no value. In attempting to correct one error, we have a tendency to swing to the other extreme - to say that, because we have previously strayed (or seen others stray) by valuing and seeking intellectual knowledge without the corresponding practice of virtue and devotion, we must completely abandon the pursuit of knowledge and simply attempt to live ethically and with love. But what we see taught here is that the acts of the understanding do still have value for the Christian. And when we think about it, we see that it must be so, for the acts of the understanding create for us a compass of truth, giving direction and guidance to the acts of the will. Without that compass, our will would be adrift in the chaos of ever-changing opinion, confused, "tossed to and fro and carried about by every wave of doctrine" (Eph. 4:14), without direction or purpose, never attaining to the great and glorious end for which God has created us.

However, it is equally clear that to stop here, having obtained a working compass, would be insufficient. Simply knowing the direction we ought to travel will not lead to the completion of the voyage! This is why the acts of the will are of such great value: it is by them, by choosing to "love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind" (Mt. 22:37) and to find in Him our soul's true pleasure and delight, that the ship actually sails. By the acts of our will we show whether we are following the direction our understanding has established, or ignoring it in favor of some other course; by them also - and only by them - we advance towards the destination of our voyage: full holiness and true unity with God.

Fighting for joy

Sometimes in the midst of life it is difficult to see the big picture. Life is often compared to a journey or a path, through which we are traveling, but it can frequently seem more like the endless futile circles of an eddy off the main course of a river: coming from nowhere, going to nowhere, and doing nothing meaningful in the interim. If it is a path, we don't seem able to see either the progress we've made so far or the goal ahead, and maybe even the direction the path is going.

When we feel this way - or at least, when I feel this way - it can be incredibly easy to lose hope. The past feels hopeless first because it is unchangeable, but also because it can seem to be a lost and straggling road, meandering through worthless endeavors in pursuit of meaningless goals, and because so often we feel that God has done nothing in our lives through all those years - that we have not grown, that we have not born fruit, that He has not accomplished any of that transformational change in which we find life, joy, and love. Burdened with the weight of past futility, it is hard to find reason for hope in the present; even when we do something well, when life is full of happiness and light, when the people we love have the same love for us in return, and when we feel close to God and excited by our deepening relationship with Him, the curse whispers in the back of our minds: "It is a passing dream; it is all an illusion; in the deepest core of reality, no one loves you and nothing you do will ever amount to anything." If we listen to that diabolical voice, it will veil the eyes of our heart to the goodness of God and murder the happiness and love we so deeply desire to know and to share. And it will begin to poison our hope for the future as well, by making us believe that in our truest being we are utter failures, worthless creatures incapable of ever achieving the great and beautiful visions we once had.

How can we, as Christians who are commanded to rejoice always, fight against this vision of the world and of ourselves, against these emotions that threaten to destroy whatever true hope there actually is for our lives? The first step, which seems too obvious to mention for those who have never been there, but which may appear almost impossible to those who are overwhelmed with this sense of futility and despair, is to desire joy. It is easy to say that we desire joy - after all, who wouldn't choose joy, light, and love over despair, darkness, and pain? But look at your heart and your mind in the middle of the black mood. When the little merry whispers come bringing you news of great joy, do you want to listen to them? Do you choose to listen to them, or do you push them aside so you can hold on to the darkness and the anger? I realized this week, for probably the first time in my life, that I am often doing just that - thrusting away the very light and love that my heart is crying out for, so that I can hold on to the blackness in my mind. And if we find ourselves choosing, my friends, to hold on to the hatred and the pain, then we have shown ourselves capable of choice in those moments of seemingly overwhelming despair. We are not thoroughly overwhelmed; we are not left without hope. For we still can choose.

After wanting joy, then, comes the desperately difficult task of choosing joy in every moment that the darkness tempts us. This is where we learn to be vigilant against sin (for despair is a sin, since it sets itself up against the true hope that is in Christ), to strengthen our wills and minds and bodies in fighting for the kingdom (for even these small battles in our minds, that seem to have no larger meaning or value, are battles waged for the kingdom of God against the power of sin and Satan), and to trust more deeply and completely in the grace and love of our Lord. This is where we discover the power of truth and the wonder of joy, the strength of hope and the might of faith, as we employ them in our service as weapons of war and see our foes defeated before us - and it is where we discover the riches of the grace of God as He forgives and restores every time we fall before them. He is the ultimate conqueror, after all, and will lead us in triumph; He will not forsake us, He will not stop loving us, and He does not consider us failures, no matter how purposeless our lives may seem. In Him, if we choose it, is joy unending, joy that is stronger than any pain or blackness. It was not idly, as an impossible ideal, that Paul wrote for us to rejoice always in Christ, and we can fight to grasp and keep that joy, vibrant and strong and beautiful, in our lives. And so we must fight, if we are to know and to follow God.

Freely suffering

Mentally, I'm still on Good Friday. I realized something this year, on Good Friday, about what Jesus endured for us, that I think had never really struck me before: that the suffering He faced, He walked through of His own volition. He says as much to His disciples: "do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide me with more than twelve legions of angels?" (Mt. 26:53). It is one thing to endure sufferings when one is forced into them and has no way of escape, but must simply persevere; it is another thing altogether to continue to embrace those sufferings when it is completely within one's power to avoid them - and that is precisely what Christ did.

(Tangentially, I think that the value of fasting may lie in this very truth - that Christ walked through every moment of His sufferings intentionally and deliberately - because in fasting we also choose to take up suffering and embrace it, even though at any time we could choose to step out of our suffering back into bodily comfort and pleasure. So in fasting our understanding of Christ's suffering for us can grow experientially, not just intellectually, even though the suffering is comparatively so small. The spiritual and physical discipline may also help us to be able to endure greater sufferings in the future, ones that we have not chosen and cannot escape, but I can't speak to that personally.)

Anyway, the fact that Jesus did indeed walk through that suffering freely - compelled only by His love for us and for His Father - demonstrates the incredible depth and greatness of that love. The verse that has lingered in my mind all through Holy Week is the one with which the apostle John begins his telling of the great story, as the disciples gather together to celebrate the Passover with Jesus for the last time:

"Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end." - John 13:1 (emphasis added)

 His love truly is the love that does not fail. Even when faced with the cross, it did not fail, and He loved us to the end. And that, I think, is the most wonderful foundation on which to build the rest of my life: on the love of Jesus, that will never let me down, and which led Him to die that I might know God, and in knowing God find life.

Love beyond comprehension

"And when I think

That God His Son not sparing

Sent Him to die

I scarce can take it in,

That on the cross,

My burden gladly bearing,

He bled and died

To take away my sin."

This week we remember the primary reason why Jesus came to earth as a man at all: to suffer and die, that we might be freed from sin and restored to life in Him. He did not come to be merely a Teacher and an example for us to follow; the moral standards God desired His people to obey were already revealed and codified in the Mosaic Law, and in every culture there have been great philosophers and moral teachers who have given us the basic information we need about what is right and what is wrong. God did not need to come Himself in the flesh - to utterly humble Himself and live in poverty and die in agony and shame - to simply give us more teaching. No, He has come to make us new. He has come to give us new life, to reconcile us to God, to redeem us from the depths of sin, to release us from the burdens of fear and judgment and condemnation by taking those burdens on Himself. He chose to pass through incredible depths of suffering and humiliation that we might be raised to incredible heights of glory and joy. We see this week, as we remember the sacrifice Jesus made, that His love for us truly is beyond all our comprehension - but we are also reminded that we can know that love experientially, in Christ, even as it is revealed to be deeper and higher and wider than we can intellectually understand.

"Then sings my soul, my Savior, God, to Thee:
How great Thou art,
How great Thou art!
Then sings my soul, my Savior, God, to Thee:
How great Thou art,
How great Thou art!"

Walking in our faith

Sometimes I think we over-intellectualize our faith. Instead of learning from and applying the basic, simple, understandable meanings of the scriptures we read, we try to probe ever more deeply into the text - to see new insights that maybe no one else in our circle had seen before, or to build up theories and systems of doctrine. And sometimes it is good to search more deeply into the passages, to gain a fuller understanding of the words, their context, and their application: to use our minds to seek after the knowledge of God through His word. I think, however, that it is not always beneficial. C.S. Lewis once wrote about the dangers of theoretically and intellectually understanding a passage without equivalent practical and personal understanding - of having one's head filled with knowledge and ideas, but not having trained one's hands and feet and heart in the disciplines of obedience, service, and love. It can make us think we are farther along in our growth in the faith than we truly are, and it can begin to plant in us the seeds of spiritual pride. As Paul writes,

"Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. And if anyone thinks that he knows anything, he knows nothing  yet as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, this one is known by Him." - 1 Corinthians 8:1-3

It can be easy for certain types of people to acquire knowledge of the Bible and appear wise and mature in their faith, while in their heart drifting away from the foundational truths of the gospel, and in their life still needing to learn how to live out of the love and grace of God. I speak as one of these people, honestly. Acquisition of knowledge, in any sphere of my life, comes easily and is enjoyable, so it makes sense that I would delight in that part of the Christian life and begin to neglect other aspects of the faith! But God has redeemed and desires to transform our entire being, not just our minds. He wants to change our hearts, that they might learn compassion, mercy, forgiveness, and empathy. He wants to change our mouths, that they might learn to speak with truth and grace, to encourage and uplift and edify, to forego biting scorn and sarcasm. He wants to change our hands, that they might learn to give from love (of God and of others) rather than from duty, that they might labor not for our own good, but for the glory of God and in service (however menial or unpleasant) to others. He wants to change our feet, that they might not carry us to places of pleasure, comfort, and entertainment, but to places where the darkness of sin is powerful and the need and suffering of our fellow human beings is great. He wants to change our will, that it should no longer be bound by our stomachs, or our sexual desires, or any of our natural sinful tendencies, but instead be freely following Him. God wants us to grow in our knowledge - there is no doubt or argument about that - but this growth of knowledge should be informed by our love of God and of others, and it is only a part of the growth and change that He desires of us.

So as we read, let us also seek to apply - not in the typical Bible study meaning of that word, that rarely leads to true and lasting change, but in the sense of honestly striving to live in obedience to the commands of God, by His grace, and from a foundation of love. When we read, let us first seek to know and understand God more, and then seek to discover how we ought to be living with and for Him in our faith! And if we find that a certain path we have chosen does not honor Him, or if we find that we have been ignoring or neglecting certain aspects of our faith, then we should immediately step off that path or begin to cultivate those aspects of our faith. Our reading and studying should be for the purpose of following God more closely, not for the sake of being the one with the most knowledge and the deepest insights. The Christian faith is profoundly this-wordly, to use Bonhoeffer's language; it calls us to live completely in the world, even though we are not of the world - to genuinely love, to sacrificially serve, and to wholeheartedly obey - to walk in the truths of the gospel, not merely to know them in our minds.

Finding love

From Sherry Turkle, the author of the book Alone Together, about the effects of the rise of personal technology on human society and relationships (I found the quote at the Futurisms blog at New Atlantis, but the whole interview with Turkle at IASC is also worth reading):

"People are so vulnerable and so willing to accept substitutes for human companionship in very intimate ways. I hadn't seen that coming, and it really concerns me that we're willing to give up something that I think defines our humanness: our ability to empathize and be with each other and talk to each other and understand each other. And I report to you with great sadness that the more I continued to interview people about this, the more I realized the extent to which people are willing to put machines in this role. People feel that they are not being heard, that no one is listening. They have a fantasy that finally, in a machine, they will have a nonjudgmental companion."

Isn't that truly what people want? We want someone who will love us unconditionally, regardless of what we say or do - someone who will be there when we need a friend, listen when we need to talk, and make us feel as though we have some value and worth. In the hidden depths of our hearts, we're terrified of reaching the end of our lives only to realize that we have accomplished nothing meaningful and are going to die alone and unloved. If we can have some kind of affirmation and companionship as we go through life, it helps to assuage those fears, and if we look to some non-human source for that affirmation and companionship, whether it be animals or robots, we can satisfy our emotional needs (or at least dull their ache) without having to endure the risks, pains, and fears of human relationships and meaningful work.

Ultimately, of course, pursuing intimacy and meaning in that way is bankrupt; it may give us comfort for a time, but it stifles our emotional growth and prevents the deepening and maturing of our hearts, and in the end we are left unfulfilled and despairing. But as my brother wrote (in an unpublished document; you can read more of his writing here):

"We are a world devoid of love, a shadow land, hiding itself from the true light, and so we must cast open the windows - no, tear down the very roof. Love is the great irony, the caustic force that banishes the dark and drives out the meaningless. [...] The answer must be to love and love only. The answer must be to live from love, for all action to emanate from love."

What I see in the desperate terrified longing of so many people in our society, in the deep desire for intimacy coupled with the intense fear of pain and worthlessness, is an open invitation to live out the love of Christ in our world - to be the human being who listens to the sorrows and worries of our neighbors, who stands with them through their joys and their troubles, and who loves them unconditionally and without condemnation. In a world where everyone is withdrawing to the comfort and convenience of computer-mediated relationships and robotic companions, we can change lives and bring the gospel into our communities simply by loving, always loving, in all that we do, with genuine, face-to-face love.

Secondhand Lions

I've decided that it's much harder for me to write when I'm feeling sick. My mind gets foggy, and complete and coherent sentences run circles around my feebly grasping mind, making the formation of understandable thoughts and arguments considerably more difficult. Also, my spare time tends to be spent sleeping instead of thinking, so there are fewer thoughts to write about in the first place. However, one thing I do manage to accomplish with great regularity when sick is to watch Secondhand Lions. It's by no means what I would classify as a great movie, but it is definitely a good one, and its unique and innocent blend of reality and fantasy is perfect for those days when I want a relatively peaceful fun movie to occupy the time not spent in sleep.

One aspect of the movie, though, has always bothered me (if you haven't watched the movie, don't read further; I don't want to accidentally give anything away). At the relational climax of the movie, one of the older men tells his nephew, the main character, that things like goodness, justice, honesty and love are worth everything, while power and money are worth nothing. So far so good, right? But then he goes on to say that a man should believe in those good things, and believe that they are worth more than power and money, even if it isn't true, and that bothers me! Those things are worth believing in because they are true, because they come from the God of truth; their value is not independent of their truth status. So every time I come to that part of the movie I cringe a little, and wish they had written that part of the script differently.

Tonight as I watched the movie, however, I realized something. The uncle is wrong when he says that truth doesn't matter, but there is a grain of truth in his error, and it shows in how his advice is applied in the movie. The nephew is faced with a situation in which two opposing stories have been presented to him about his uncles: the story that they told him about their past, in which they lived with courage, justice, and love; and the story that several other characters throughout the movie have suggested, in which the uncles were thieves and ultimately cowards. The nephew has no way to determine which of these stories is true, but he is forced into a position where he has to make a choice. In that situation, would it be better for him to believe in the goodness and honesty of these two men (since their purported deceit and criminal actions have not been proven), or to believe that they lived for the pursuit of power and money (since, after all, they have quite a lot of money from some unknown source)? More generally, is it better to believe that a person acted with good intentions and can respond to a given situation with justice, honesty, and compassion, or is it better to believe that they acted with the intention to hurt and would respond to confrontation or rebuke with deceit, malice, and self-centeredness?

Let's look at the question from another perspective. When you or I make a mistake, say something that unintentionally hurts someone else, or do something sinful, do we automatically assume that we are full of spite and that our every action and word is deliberately hurtful or malicious? Do we assume that the worst possibility is, in fact, the reality about ourselves? Usually, unless we know without a doubt that the worst possibility is truly the reality (and sometimes even then), we do not. We give ourselves the benefit of the doubt, so to speak, because we want to believe that our actions are motivated by goodness and integrity even when they may not appear that way. And why do we want to believe this, when the evidence could be taken in a negative direction as easily as a positive? Simply, it is because we love ourselves. Because we love ourselves, we don't want to believe that we are as bad and nasty and small as we appear, and we want to become better.

Well, we are commanded to love each other as ourselves. If in loving ourselves we find ourselves wanting to believe in our own courage, justice, and honesty whenever reasonable evidence arises, then we should be doing the same for other people. We shouldn't desire to discover that their actions are motivated by malice, or interpret their words in a way that portrays them in the worst possible light. Instead of assuming that someone is intending to hurt or offend, when that is not the only plausible assumption, we should assume that they misunderstood, or didn't hear, or some other explanation of a more innocent sort.

One advantage of looking at other people in this way is that it encourages those good things in our own souls. When we are actively looking for goodness, love, honesty, and justice in other people, it motivates us to cultivate them in ourselves, and helps us to mentally dwell on those positive and praiseworthy qualities. Another advantage is that it helps keep us from unjust anger towards others, because we are not assuming that they intended to hurt us, and are thus far less tempted to bitterness, grudge-holding, and revenge-seeking. So while it is sometimes very necessary to acknowledge the sinfulness of another person's intentions, it is in most circumstances much more helpful to assume, when such an assumption is possible, that they are not so evil and miserable as they might seem - to believe, even though you cannot know that it is true, that they are acting with justice, goodness, and honesty.

Alright, hopefully that made some sense :P Like I said, I'm sick and I'm having a lot of trouble putting thoughts and words together. If I said anything that seems totally wrong, please allow me to claim the mental fog of sickness as my excuse :)

God with us

In the midst of all that is evil and ugly and dark - in the middle of our failures, frustrations, sorrows, and dashed dreams - God stands with us. And with God is light, joy, hope, and truth. Where He is, grace triumphs over failure, condemnation is defeated by mercy, and sorrow is comforted by the love that went to the cross on our behalf. All the darkness of this world is passing; the light of God is everlasting. It will endure, and because we are in Him we will endure with it, through the destruction of all that is sinful and fallen into the restoration and renewal of all thing good and noble and lovely - through death into life.

This world and its worries lie heavy on us, and we struggle with burdens beyond our strength and pains that seem to split our heart in pieces, and it is only a small comfort to know that someday they will pass away. What is greater is to know that God is with us, now, through those things. He is not distantly waiting for us to reach Him at the end of our lives! He is walking with us, by the quiet waters, in the green pastures, and even through the valley of the shadow of death.

Little gifts and mighty graces

God is always giving us little gifts - the sun coming out after rain, the happiness of welcoming a loved one home again, good food and a full stomach, the comforting warmth of blankets and pillows at the end of the day, the quiet pleasure of a day of rest, and so on. Indiscriminately, he fills our days full of these little gifts; sometimes we rejoice in them with gratitude, and sometimes we hardly notice them. Assuming we choose not to ignore them, though, these little gifts are enough to bring us joy and satisfaction for a lifetime. However, God does not limit Himself to them. His purpose, being set on eternity as well as temporality, is not content with merely blessing us in this life; He wishes also to bless us with gifts that will last for eternity and with gifts that will bring eternity to our hearts here and now. Obviously the greatest of these gifts is salvation! In between this overwhelming, unfathomable, unbelievable grace, and the little daily graces that we take for granted, though, are many rich and beautiful gifts - graces that surprise and amaze us with their extravagance, and that transform and inspire our hearts.

These intermediate graces are, I think, children of the grace of salvation. Having saved us - having bought us with the blood of Christ, adopted us into His family, and sealed us with His Spirit - God is not content to have merely covered us with His righteousness: He desires to cause that righteousness to grow up and bear fruit within our very hearts. To accomplish this purpose, He bestows upon us these sanctifying graces. There is the grace of knowing His tender comfort in the midst of great sorrow; of gaining security and peace through His strength becoming our defense in times of worry or fear; of hearing His ever-loving voice answer our confusion with His truth; and so on. They are less frequent than the little common graces, but they are also more powerful. They cause us to know God more, and thus they are indescribably wonderful.

One of the most wonderful of these graces is when God removes for a moment some veil of sin and allows us to see something with His eyes instead of our own. We may not have even realized that our vision was so obscured - but then all at once everything looks different, and we know that it looks as it truly is and the way we had formerly perceived it was skewed and blurred. To compare it to something much more trivial, it is akin to putting on a pair of glasses and suddenly seeing the world without the astigmatism and myopia. Overwhelmed by joy, the heart effortlessly overflows with praise; it is impossible to contain the gratitude at being given such a grace as this, at being privileged for one brief moment to see with clearer sight. There is humility, also, in the knowledge that the vision is not born of any merit of our own, but is purely gift and grace, and in the deepened recognition of our sinfulness and of how small our relationship with God really is - but it is the humility of self-forgetfulness, not the humility of despair. With eyes newly open in Christ to some beautiful and glorious truth, we lose ourselves in Him; our whole being is colored through and through with His radiance, and His light is the joy of our hearts.

There is a strange shyness about the things we see by these graces; the sweetness is too piercing and too intimate for it to be revealed to the world as some great spiritual experience. It is like trying to tell someone the secrets you whisper with your lover - the joy is too high, the love is too great, and above all the thing itself pulls back from being told. These graces change our hearts and draw us nearer to God; they give us new eyes to see more clearly; they are the planting of seeds and the bearing of fruit in our lives; but they themselves are not known outside the heart in which they labor. They are the love-notes of our eternal Bridegroom, delighting in His Bride.

Meditation on 2 John

If I had to summarize the main theme of 2 John into one sentence, I think I would say that it is about the importance of truth and the eternal and relational aspects and consequences of holding to the truth or failing to do so. Specifically, he makes these claims about truth:

• it is the foundation of our love and unity as members of the body of Christ (v1)
• it is eternal in essence and will be with us forever (v2); it will not change or fade
• it abides in us (v2); it has personal significance and presence in our lives as followers of Christ
• it is one of the defining characteristics of the blessings God gives us, along with love. The grace, mercy, and peace that He promises and gives are not an illusion or a deceit; He gives them in truth (v3)
• it is how we should live - colored all through with the light of truth, in obedience to God's commandments which are true (v4-6)
• it is centered on the doctrine that Jesus is God and came into the world as a man, that He might die for our sins and give us new life in His resurrection - for our lives, as Christians, this is one truth we absolutely cannot forsake, and it is the kernel of doctrine at the center of every use of the word truth in 2 John, I believe (v7)
• it is essential to the value of the good works we do and crucial to to pleasing and honoring God, and thus receiving a reward from Him in heaven (v8)
• it is proof of the legitimacy of the relationship we claim to have with the Father and the Son - if we do not abide in that central truth of Jesus Christ, we are not His (v9)
• it takes precedence over social norms, tolerance, personal comfort, etc. - it is so important that we must take all precautions not to share in the works of deceit, even if that means conflict and "intolerance" (v10-11)
• it is the source of joy, because it is the foundation of genuine love (v12)

One of the beauties of 2 John, however, is that he doesn't make a list like this about the nature of the truth of our faith, and proceed to lecture us philosophically. Rather, the whole book is glowing with deep, warm, godly love; all the points that I extracted were clothed in the rich garments of the love and personal concern that John had for the lady to whom he was writing and for her children, and I think this too is crucially important for us as we try to live in truth. It shows up a bit in my first and last points, but I would phrase it differently now: if a claimed belief in the truth of Jesus Christ does not outwardly manifest itself in the growth of genuine love for others, it is not true belief or it is at best belief that is neglected and dying. If we take root in the soil of His truth, we will bear the fruit of love. In our faith, the two are inextricably linked; any effort to hold to one while compromising the other is a failure and in some cases even a heresy. The issue is not one of finding a middle ground between the two where both truth and love can be uneasily and half-heartedly expressed, because this assumes that they are in conflict, and the whole wonderful point of 2 John is that they not in conflict at all, but are rather joined together in their work and in their very essence. Truth and love, exulting in the beauty they restore to our broken, sin-ridden world - this is the picture John paints for us in this little book, and it is glorious indeed.

A burden or a blessing?

On Friday, Paul flew to Memphis for an interview for physical therapy school. Unfortunately, his flight left at 5:30 in the morning, which with the state of security meant that we needed to leave the house at 4:00. On Thursday, I was telling people at work about this and one woman (who is married and had coincidentally driven her husband to an early morning flight earlier in the week) responded with, "oh, and I suppose he expects you to take him to the airport, right?"

The next day, after I dropped Paul off, I went straight in to work (early in, early out!) and one of the maintenance guys saw me about 6:00 and asked why I was there so early. When I told him about Paul's flight, his whole face lit up with this big grin and he said, "oh, so you got to drive him there!" It was so sweet.

Anyway, it was primarily the contrast between the two responses that stood out to me. On the one hand, the service is seen as something grudgingly performed out of a sense of duty because my husband actually expected me to do something out of the ordinary for him (I don't know if the woman from my work really thinks of it this way; it is just the impression I got from her response. She is quite a nice lady from what I can see). On the other hand, the service was seen almost as a privilege - something special that I got to do for my husband whom I love.

Before I talked to these two people, I hadn't thought about why I was driving Paul to the airport. He needed someone to drive him, and who better than me? But I can tell you now what reason I would rather have to do any similar act of service that comes my way! Instead of viewing it as a chore and a burden, I want to see it as a blessing and a joy, as a way to show Paul how much I truly love him.

Contentment, commitment, and love

Love is founded on commitment. It is what allows love to rise above the ebb and flow of emotions to become something enduring and precious. So in order to have a truly lasting love, it is necessary to set your will beneath it - to choose, when emotions are high and love seems to carry all away before it, to keep loving even when those emotions have disappeared and the intoxicating aroma of new love has faded away.

Of all the things that erode this determination of the will, discontentment is, I think, one of the most potent. Cultivating an attitude of discontent will inevitably eat away at one's commitment to another person and thus destroy one's love for that person from within. There is always a fault to be found in one's current situation or with a particular friend or with one's husband or wife. Especially for someone idealistic like me, who is always searching for the best in any situation, it is easy to see those shortcomings! When I was single, for example, I often longed for the union and deep mutual knowing and love of marriage, and now within marriage I keep wondering how our relationship and service to God could be improved and am tempted to compare our marriage with others. Instead of finding ways to serve and honor God at my current job and time of life, I wish that I could be in a more active ministry or even in foreign missions. In every case, the issue lies within my heart: I fail to see the opportunities that lie in my present situation, looking rather at the multitude of opportunities that abound in different situations all around me. I choose to focus on the shortcomings of where I am now instead of on the great blessings that are hidden in these circumstances, and in so doing I allow my heart to be filled with dissatisfaction and discontent - and my love diminishes.

Whence, then does true contentment come? How can I be content in the circumstances and relationships I have now instead of yearning for something else? It comes from the Lord God. If my heart has found its rest in Christ, then it derives full satisfaction from Him alone, regardless of where my life may take me. As the psalmist said,

"How precious is Your lovingkindness, O God!Therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of Your wings.They are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of Your house,And You give them drink from the river of Your pleasures." - Psalm 36:7-8

If my deep satisfaction comes from God, then I don't need to look for it in my situation, and I can even have the joy in my heart necessary to see the good and the beautiful in my circumstances no matter what they are. With this contentment, then (stemming from God and opening my eyes to the many blessings I have in my current position), I can strengthen my commitment to the ones I love, and thus build a more lasting love for them.

The wonder of all loves

This is love: that after a weekend of being physically and emotionally miserable, unable to give much time or energy to Paul or to the house, I got to come home from work Monday to hugs and kisses and an evening spent together (being relatively nerdy and watching WWII documentaries!). His love for me comes from his heart, where the Spirit of God dwells, and so he loves me regardless of how well I am loving him in return. That is true love, because it is like God's love.

This is love: that after years of taking out all our sorrows and frustrations on Him in anger and bitterness - after lifetimes spent ignoring His voice and spitting on His extended hand of grace and goodness - after countless times of turning away, shutting Him out, closing our ears and our eyes and our hearts - we can still come home to His embrace, to bask in His presence where there is peace and joy beyond compare and, most of all, Himself, God with us. His love is utterly unconditional, pouring down upon us regardless of how often we sin or how frequently we fall away. If only we would turn and see it - like a girl turning east to suddenly see (and marvel how she had not turned before!) the sun rising in a swirl of color and cloud, in splendor and hope - we could lose ourselves in the wonder of its beauty and the glory of its power. That is true love, because it is God's love.

Thank You for this love that knocks me down and carries me away in gratitude and awe, Lord - that stretches the bounds of my mind, that sinks lower and rises higher than I can comprehend, and that never ever leaves me! And thank You for the loves that illuminate Your love by being like it and stemming from it, that help me to understand Your love more completely, and fill my heart with gladness and peace. You are great, O Lord, and Your gifts to us in our lowliness and weakness are more great and good than my heart or my mind can fully grasp.

Letting the dishes pile up

When something needs to be done, there are three possibilities that can occur. First, you can take care of it. Second, you can ignore it and let someone else take care of it. Third, you can ignore, and the other someones in your life can ignore it, and it will never get done (although you can opt out of this third path at any time...).

For example, if I come home late from work, tired after a long day, and I see a pile of dishes in the sink, I can wash them right then or I can ignore them and hope Paul will take care of them. If he does, I have successfully gotten away with not doing the dishes that night. But you know what else I have accomplished? I have succeeded in putting my interests above his - because no one does dishes just for the fun of it, and everyone is tired at the end of the day. I have succeeded in valuing my time more than his - because it is going to take one of us 10-15 minutes to clean it up, and if I think my time is more important, than it certainly won't be me (or I'll do it grudgingly with sighs or complaints). I have succeeded in putting my husband down and taking his love for me for granted instead of treasuring and respecting him.

On the other hand, if he doesn't do the dishes that night either, there are that many more dishes staring up at me the next morning when I'm trying to get ready for work, and the longer I let them sit there, the more they become a burden on me and on Paul - they make the kitchen messy and cluttered, impede anything productive in the kitchen (like making dinner!), and eventually reduce our clean dishes to the point where we're eating everything on napkins (this hasn't actually ever happened yet, thankfully! :) )

Do you see the issue? With something as trivial as dishes it doesn't really matter that much whether you deny yourself and get the job done. You may do it the next day, when the pile is beginning to drive you crazy, or when you aren't so tired. But with many other things in life it really does matter that you deny yourself when the task - or the opportunity, if you want to be optimistic - presents itself. If one of my friends is struggling with serious emotional or spiritual issues and wants to talk to me about them, I should take up that opportunity and fill that need no matter how inconvenient it may be, because that is what it looks like to consider others as better than myself, and that is how a Christian ought to be living. If Paul comes home from school discouraged and exhausted, I should lay hold of the opportunity to shower him with love, truth, and encouragement, even if I am also tired and emotionally weary, because that is what it means to put the needs of others before my own needs, and that is how a Christian ought to be living.

Obviously this isn't something we can do in our own strength (well, maybe some of you can, but I think most of us need God's grace and strength far more than we admit. I know I do). The wonderful and glorious truth, though - the one that enables us to do far harder tasks than we ever thought possible to meet the needs of other people - is that God will give us the strength we need to obey and honor Him. He has prepared good works for us to do, and if they are above our strength He will carry the rest of the load, if we ask Him to be our help.

And those little things like the dishes in the sink? They are our training-ground, our chance to practice denying ourselves so that when the opportunities come to do great things for the kingdom of God we will be prepared to give all that we have, through Him and for Him, in love and service to others.

A path to lasting joy

When someone serves you thoughtfully and lovingly, it can really make you feel awesome! For instance, when I got home from work yesterday and was relaxing for a minute on the couch while baking cake after dinner (I tend to make my evenings as busy at home as my days are busy away from home), Paul casually rubbed my foot and it felt so good. I hadn't realized how tense and sore my feet and legs were! But you know what was even better? When I mentioned how good that little rub made me feel, he got all excited and asked if he could rub my feet! Oh my goodness that was nice. It was a kind and thoughtful act performed in a way that made me feel special to him instead of a burden on him (serving with a poor attitude can make the person you're helping feel worse than if you'd done nothing, unfortunately), and it filled up my heart with gratitude and love. But if I came home every night and expected Paul to serve me, without doing or even desiring to do anything for him out of my love for him, that joy I feel in receiving his love would soon fade and wither away. Joy and self-centeredness cannot coexist. Pleasure can survive for a while longer, but even that eventually dies under the scorching sun of selfishness, and in time the one served comes to look upon the one loving and serving with contempt (unless by God's grace the hardened heart is softened enough to begin to love in return). So I find that in giving myself and my time and my energy to Paul - to try to serve him and love him thoughtfully, gently, and reverently - not thinking of what I might gain but of how I might pour over him the fullness of my love for him - a spring of joy starts up in my own soul. By choosing to make another's happiness my goal, even though I do it stumbling like a child learning to walk, I find more true happiness and joy for myself than if I had pursued my own wellbeing with all the passion and strength I could muster. It's interesting how that works, isn't it? When we follow the commands of God - to consider others better than ourselves, to look out for their needs, or to imitate Jesus in our relationships with other people (and remember, He washed His disciples' feet!) - we end up with more joy and peace and fulfillment than when we try to forge our own paths to obtain those things! Now let's see if I can remember this the next time I'm in the middle of a conflict between doing what I know is best, to show love for someone else, and doing what makes me feel comfortable and happy in the moment...

Living and loving

When a person does something kind for another person, and does it genuinely intending to be kind, there are two main motivating reasons: first, they are doing it out of love for the other person; second, they are doing it in hopes that the other person will love them. At least, these are the two contrasting motivations I have seen in my own life, as I go about trying to do things for others and for God, and I like to think that I'm not the only person with this struggle :) Sometimes, selfless acts and encouraging words spring up from a heart full of God's love and eager to pass it on; other times, I force those acts and words up from a desperately dry and empty heart yearning to be filled by another's love. If I am secure in the belief that I am loved by God no matter what - that I don't need to strive to be righteous to merit His love or to keep it from fading away - then it is far easier to genuinely love others and act towards them not just in the right way, but with the right heart and attitude. It allows me to gain the confidence I need to show love to other people out of genuine love (growing ever more like God's love, hopefully) instead of in a self-centered attempt to win their love in return.

The difference between serving someone out of love for them and serving them in hopes of earning their love is incredibly vast. In the first there is joy, confidence, and inner peace; in the second there is loneliness, a pervading sense of unworthiness, and constant fear. I feel like this is a very basic concept that I am only now fully starting to experientially understand :P But now that I am beginning to grasp it, and to see the fullness of life that comes from living out of God's love, that is what I am going to try to do. Instead of thinking, "I ought to make supper so Paul will keep loving me" (as a rather simple example), I can think "I love Paul! And I have this opportunity to bless him by making him supper!" However, that capacity to love another person and have that love be the foundation of my actions toward them can only come from God, from walking close to Him through every part of every day, from drinking in His word and constantly turning to Him in prayer. This is probably why I have so much trouble with it - I am trying to manufacture love on my own instead of channeling it through my heart from the overflowing spring of God's love. So here's to relying on God, right? :) He is our strength, as the Psalms are continually reminding us, and if we build our lives on Him He will not let us down.

A poem

A poem written by my great-grandmother Loella Woolley:


My Prayer
Lord, help me not to hurt the ones I love,
Nor ever tread with heavy step
On feelings that are tender -
Feelings that are beautiful and rare.

Forgive me when I've failed to understand
How much some thoughtless act of mine
Can hurt the ones for whom I truly care.

Keep me alert in mind and heart
And never let me walk unthinking,
Blinded by selfish pride,
But help me know that You are there

And waiting to forgive once more
My contrite heart. And when tomorrow dawns
Help me to start anew, as if today had never been.
This is my prayer.

The dirt itself rejoices

It can be so easy to be discontented with where I am in life, even when rationally I am convinced that I am where God wants me to be. I look back to the past, and miss things I used to do that, for whatever reason, are no longer a part of my life (like short-term mission trips, or going to my old church), or I miss dreams that I once had that I now know can no longer ever be (at least not in the way I had envisioned them, once upon a time). I look forward to the future, and I see all the hopes and plans and desires I have, and can become impatient in my desiring, unable to wait for them to come to fruition in God's timing. Or I can look at the present, and choose to see only the things that aren't quite right, that make me uncomfortable or anxious or stressed.

You know what the problem is, with this way of looking at the world?

It never leaves you a time to be happy.

The way to be happy - the way to find joy - is to praise God in the present, to seek Him now, to choose to see the beauty in the place and time in which He has set you, to thank Him for His goodness and faithfulness and sovereignty in working out everything - here and now - just the way He has. When you look at the world through eyes of trust and gratitude, you can be content anywhere; when you look at the world through eyes of discontentment, striving to make yourself and your circumstances worthwhile by your own strength, you will never be content though you have everything you thought your heart desired.

When the rain finally falls after a long drought, the dirt itself in its dryness rejoices. Do I rejoice when the rain of His refreshing falls on my thirsty soul, or do I complain that it is not enough?

"Because Your lovingkindness is better than life,
My lips shall praise You.
Thus I will bless You while I live;
I will lift up my hands in Your name.
My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness,
And my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips." - Psalm 63:3-5, emphasis added

His love is enough reason to be satisfied, regardless of what else is happening in my life.

Unfailing love

"Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us." - Romans 8:34

If you would, stop and think about that verse for a while. When I read it on Monday, it shattered the blinders that had been covering my eyes, and melted my heart with the sudden realization of how very much I am loved by God.

See how rich and unfailing is the love of God! It was not demonstrated once only at the Cross, but continues without pause through the present and for all eternity. Jesus our Lord, the One who died on our behalf, is still our mediator, still our intercessor, standing between us and condemnation. We cannot earn such love, but the glorious truth is that we do not need to earn it! He gladly overflows our hearts with it, floods our lives with it, and utterly overwhelms our small attempts at meriting grace with it. Every time we fail and sin again He says, "This one is already covered. She is mine, and I have paid the penalty for her sins, and I hold her fast for all eternity in the depths of my love."