lindsey.

love.  

when i hear this word, things like happiness, joy, bliss, joyful service, smiles, sweet times, and enjoying other people come to mind.  generally, my view of love is really positive.  it goes hand in hand with positive experiences.  i’ve never really been in a situation where loving someone is not enjoyable.  

as a believer, i always point to the Son as the perfect example of love.  its why i serve my friends (“modeling His humility”), its why i do things that maybe seem unpleasant.  yet, those things never seem burdensome.  i want to do them.  when i love my friends, i rarely consider that they might reject my love, and i certainly don’t worry about loving my friends causing me pain.  the thing about the Son’s love, is that it was painful.  it wasn’t fun. his humility did not come without pain and rejection.  in fact, his love brought scorn, ridicule, and rejection.

the love of the Father is impossible, yet this is the kind of love that I am really called to.  it is costly, and perhaps unpleasant.  this kind of love is truly selfless - when you love someone with no gain for yourself.  i have never experienced giving this type of love.  in a situation where i am to love someone who is not easy to love, i become impatient, unkind, short tempered, and, above all, UN-loving.  

i am incredibly convicted by paul’s words to the phillipians in the second chapter, where he writes:

So if there is any encouragement in [the Son], any comfort from love, any participation in the [HS], any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in [the Son], who, though he was in the form of [the Father], did not count equality with [Him] a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross […] it is [He] who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. 

may this be my heart, and may i know and give this love, only by Him, who works this love in and through me.  amen.