Mitch and I have been attending a small group through our church for the past month, and while I'm pretty much enjoying it, I'm not really on board with some of the content. We're doing this "40 Days of Communty" thing put together by Rick Warren, and last week it was all about love, and why Christians need to love each other, and what God (or Rick?) means by love.
Basically, Rick takes the statements from Corinthians and puts forth that love must have all these components (love protects, trusts, hopes, and perseveres) to be real Christian love.
I think that's asking a bit much. I have some relationships that definitely fit that definition of love: with Mitch, my parents, my brother, some other family members, and some of my friends. But as Christians, we're supposed to "love" everyone, and I don't see it very feasible to protect, trust, hope with, and persevere with everyone.
I like C.S. Lewis's definition of Christian love a lot better: to wish good for all people. According to Lewis, I don't have to feel fond of people (and why would I necessarily trust, protect, hope and persevere with those of whom I am not fond?) but I do have to wish for their good.
That, to me, makes a lot more realistic sense. I'm not saying I don't want relationships with people that involve protection, trust, hope and perseverance - or that I shouldn't try to build new relationships that emboy those qualities - but I don't think there's any way I can have that with everyone. I can, however, try to swallow feelings of annoyance or disapproval or whatever and sincerely wish good for everyone.
I don't know if that made sense, but it's been on my mind and I wanted to put it out there.
4 comments:
Not to quibble, but shouldn't Christian love be, by definition, Christ-like love?
Wishing well for all people is certainly easier, not only on a practical level but on an emotional level as well--but it's also not sacrificial, and it's CERTAINLY not what Christ did for us. I always kind of figured that, at a minimum, Christ embodied everything God would have us be and/or do and/or strive for. Can we attain his level of perfection? No. But does that mean we should console ourselves by lowering our standards to something more attainable? Well, I don't think I can honestly say yes.
I guess this is one of the very few instances in which I'd have to say I disagree with Lewis. I see this as being roughly analogous to saying "Well, I can't be perfectly sinless, but as long as I go through life without committing any misdemeanors, I've been a good Christian,"--and I just can't believe that's what God wants from us and for us. After all, if Jesus had loved us by simply "wishing us well," then we'd all still be in a world of unredeemed hurt. You don't die on a cross for people that you don't deeply love in a way that requires you to protect, trust, hope, and persevere with them. Do you?
It's actually really odd for me to be taking this position, since we did Rick Warren's "Life Together" series back at West Hills in the 'Lou, and I basically hated the whole series. Felt like it was generally over-simplistic, didn't really bring anything new to the table, etc. Sort of felt that way about "The Purpose-Driven Life," too (although to be fair, I never managed to get all the way through it).
I guess I just have an issue with diluting the message of the gospel down to something that's "accessible" or "realistic" just because we don't feel like we can live up to the standard God demands. Now, I'm the last one to say that the Bible is the 100% inerrant word of God, and we need to follow its teachings blindly, but it seems to me that God through Christ has already outlined his stance on this pretty clearly. The fact that I can't live up to it says more about me than about its validity.
Hope you're having a great time up at Alma! See, you finally lured me out of my non-commenting shell!
Tim, you are just what I need! When I brought this up in our small group, no one wanted to debate it with me. They just sort of nodded and moved on. Thank you for giving me more to think about!
Hi Laurie!
Great topic! I'm glad you're being challenged by your new church and coming up with some really good topics of discussion.
After reading your post and comments, I have to say that I tend to agree more with Tim on this one, on the premise that Christian love should be Christ-like. My pastor did an awesome sermon on Romans 12: 9-13 about a year ago on how to love without hypocrisy. He talked about how we should make loving others a priority in our lives, and how the way we love should act as proof of our integrity. One thing he said that has really stuck with me is that until we have loved like Christ loved us, we haven't loved enough. I think John 13:34-35 and 1 Peter 1:22 are good references for this. The second part was about having proof of integrity, showing our love by our actions as detailed in the Romans passage.
I think God wants more from us than "basic" love for others; He wants Christ-like love. Those are huge shoes to fill! But we should never underestimate the power of God's Spirit in us to change our hearts to love someone more, and make that sacrificial jump from "accepting" someone to truly loving them.
We will never be able to live up to God's perfect standard of love, demonstrated by Christ's death on the cross for us, His enemies. But like Tim's analogy to sin, I don't think that means we are supposed to stop trying. I'm thankful that we have a patient God, who teaches us how to love, and doesn't give up on us when we don't love enough!
Maybe we can discuss this more next weekend! Can't wait to see you! Have a great week!
Love, Jenn
I've been thinking about your post the last few days and how I might respond. But now that I've read Tim's comment, I don't really know what more to say except the word "solidarity" keeps going through my mind. Something like "love is living in solidarity with all humans." But that doesn't fully capture my feelings and intent. About 5 weeks ago one of my most difficult students came up to me wanting to talk about her grade. It was the last day of the marking period and I was pissed that she had waited so long to show concern. I was giving her the usual "you should have taken care of this earlier" speech when she broke down in tears. She started to tell me that the reason why she had missed a few days of school was because she was working on paperwork to become emmancipated so that she could get living assisstance from the state. The reason why she needed this was because both of her parents are in prison and she's living with her grandmother who is dying of a cancerous tumor in her brain. She has no money. She has no coat for the rainy season. Her uncle just got murdered. She has no other family. This student obviously has alot more on her mind then just school work. And no matter how much her behavior or lack of work annoys me, how could I ever just say, "oh, that's too bad, I really wish you well with that"? I would feel racist and classist. I would feel sick. I would feel like I was denying who I am as a Christian. When a student feels safe enough to tell me what their real life issues are, I am glad that I feel angry about the injustices of this world. I'm glad that the love inside of me makes me cry in solidarity with people who are so very different from me. I am glad and thankful that I have gotten to interact and live with people from cultures and classes other than my own, because it has opened my eyes and heart to the way this world really is. It is so obvious how desperately changes need to be made and how those changes start with love.
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