I guess the title of this post isn't completely true. I don't suck at loving everybody. Some people make it easy. There are a few people who make it very, very hard. Most people, though, are in the middle, which means I can't blame everything on them -- how I feel about them is up to me.
I've heard many people say that love is an action, not just a feeling. But if you love somebody in deed while at the same time you really wish you could just poke their eyes out, shove them off a cliff, and sprinkle them with shark bait, what does that mean?
I really don't know. I suppose it would be an exercise in self-control, which is a good thing. But that's not really the point.
At college, I don't have a problem getting along with others. There are so many people filled with the love of God I feel that if the world could just see them all at work, every heart would belong to Him. I am drawn to all the people who look like Jesus. Among those people, I feel at my best. With their influence, I have an easier time loving others.
When I was in high school, though, I pretty much kept to myself because I didn't want to talk to anybody. By the time I graduated, I had a few close friends, but often I would hang by myself at social events I had to go to and avoid the ones I didn't. I could be friendly on an individual basis, but on the whole I did not exhibit any sort of love, Godly or no.
I maintain that there's a difference between being introverted and not loving. A few days ago, when I told my younger brother I didn't want to go hang out with people, he actually said, "Read your Bible. We're supposed to love others."
(I used self-control and no shark bait on my brother that day.)
Extroverts can suck at loving others as much as I do. At least I hope so. It just seems unfair otherwise.
There's verse upon verse that tells us to love each other -- each other being Christians, I believe. But we're also supposed to love as Jesus loved, and Jesus loved everybody, in heart and in deed. Even when he wasn't surrounded by people who made it easy for him. Even when he was tired. Even when what's-his-face was being loud and annoying.
What this means for me is that I've got problems when it comes to being like Jesus. Because trying to love someone I don't is like having my eyes poked out, being shoved over a cliff, and sprinkled with shark bait.
And that really sucks.
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label love. Show all posts
Monday, July 15, 2013
Sunday, September 23, 2012
Redeeming Love and the Book of Hosea
Last weekend, I devoured Francine Rivers's Redeeming Love. I rarely love Christian fiction, and I don't typically read romance, but after hearing how wonderful it was and finding it almost magically on my roommate's desk, I had to pick it up. I read until four in the morning and then I started again at 10 a.m. the next day until I was finished.
Coincidentally, a few days afterward, we started studying Hosea in my Hebrew prophets class. We're not all the way through, but only the first three chapters deal with the events Redeeming Love is largely based on -- Hosea, at God's command, taking the prostitute Gomer for a wife. The rest of Hosea goes back into the prophet-speak that until recently I had a hard time concentrating on.
I haven't read anything else by Francine Rivers, and I won't say that it's the best writing I've ever read. But something about Redeeming Love is deeply touching and personal. Mirrored in the complexities of Angel and Michael's relationship are a thousand circumstances and feelings that I've struggled with in my relationship with God.
The story is beautiful. However, it doesn't correspond perfectly with the events in Hosea.
Maybe that wasn't what Rivers was going for. That's fine. I'd just always heard it was "based on the book of Hosea" and so assumed certain things about it. In Redeeming Love, the relationship between Israel and God is reflected in a very personal way, but the story in the Bible is just a little different.
While reading the book of Hosea, I was always confused by how God commands Hosea to take Gomer back after she's run away: "Go again, love a woman who is loved by a lover and is committing adultery..." (NKJV) It never seemed to me that the wording suggested God was actually talking about Gomer. A woman? Is that specific enough? It turns out that it's not specific in the Hebrew, either. It doesn't actually say that Gomer runs away back to prostitution, either. People kind of infer the story from the way God and Hosea address Israel in the rest of the book. I have to wait til we're done studying Hosea to draw any more conclusions.
But what's the point? I don't know enough to be able to say what really happened to Hosea. He took the prostitute Gomer for a wife, and then again redeemed an adulteress with love. But I still think Rivers is dead on in her interpretation of the main point of the book: God wants to win back those unfaithful to Him with His love.
It's easy to take a mistaken stance in Christianity and focus on your behavior, the effectiveness of the church, even something so big as missions and make that the focal point, but really, it comes down to being loved by God. Until you understand that, you can't really love Him back. None of your good deeds can save you. You can't hide your sin. Your American Protestant work ethic does not help you. It's love God, or nothing. Anything else is prostitution of the heart.
I recommend the book to high schoolers and up. It's not graphic, but it does mention out of necessity some... well... the main character is a prostitute, after all. It's more important to realize what the story represents and how it reflects on us. It's about God's redeeming love for us. Nothing else.
Coincidentally, a few days afterward, we started studying Hosea in my Hebrew prophets class. We're not all the way through, but only the first three chapters deal with the events Redeeming Love is largely based on -- Hosea, at God's command, taking the prostitute Gomer for a wife. The rest of Hosea goes back into the prophet-speak that until recently I had a hard time concentrating on.
I haven't read anything else by Francine Rivers, and I won't say that it's the best writing I've ever read. But something about Redeeming Love is deeply touching and personal. Mirrored in the complexities of Angel and Michael's relationship are a thousand circumstances and feelings that I've struggled with in my relationship with God.
The story is beautiful. However, it doesn't correspond perfectly with the events in Hosea.
Maybe that wasn't what Rivers was going for. That's fine. I'd just always heard it was "based on the book of Hosea" and so assumed certain things about it. In Redeeming Love, the relationship between Israel and God is reflected in a very personal way, but the story in the Bible is just a little different.
While reading the book of Hosea, I was always confused by how God commands Hosea to take Gomer back after she's run away: "Go again, love a woman who is loved by a lover and is committing adultery..." (NKJV) It never seemed to me that the wording suggested God was actually talking about Gomer. A woman? Is that specific enough? It turns out that it's not specific in the Hebrew, either. It doesn't actually say that Gomer runs away back to prostitution, either. People kind of infer the story from the way God and Hosea address Israel in the rest of the book. I have to wait til we're done studying Hosea to draw any more conclusions.
But what's the point? I don't know enough to be able to say what really happened to Hosea. He took the prostitute Gomer for a wife, and then again redeemed an adulteress with love. But I still think Rivers is dead on in her interpretation of the main point of the book: God wants to win back those unfaithful to Him with His love.
It's easy to take a mistaken stance in Christianity and focus on your behavior, the effectiveness of the church, even something so big as missions and make that the focal point, but really, it comes down to being loved by God. Until you understand that, you can't really love Him back. None of your good deeds can save you. You can't hide your sin. Your American Protestant work ethic does not help you. It's love God, or nothing. Anything else is prostitution of the heart.
I recommend the book to high schoolers and up. It's not graphic, but it does mention out of necessity some... well... the main character is a prostitute, after all. It's more important to realize what the story represents and how it reflects on us. It's about God's redeeming love for us. Nothing else.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Peace, Love, Joy, and Dogs
Before coming to Taylor, the PA (equivalent to RA) on my floor emailed all of us, asking us to send pictures that reflected our decorating theme: Peace, Love, and Joy. I'm an artist, but I'm not very abstract. So I took some photographs of real things that make me feel peaceful, loving, or joyful. This was one of my pictures for Joy.
This is Kandy. Kandy's a Bernese mountain dog. My family had her for about five years. She was one of those giant dogs that thinks she's small enough to sit in your lap. She made an excellent pillow, and if you spent any amount of time loving her, she'd love you forever and ever.
I'm an animal person. My mom is a veterinarian technician, and I've worked at two vet clinics walking dogs and cleaning kennels. We now have two dogs and a cat at home, and I love both dogs and cats. The special thing about dogs, though, is how much they love people. They may be stupid or smart, obedient or ill-behaved, pretty or scraggly, but a dog that's been well cared for almost always loves its master unconditionally. Kandy was excellent at that. On a bad day, there were few things as comforting for me as sitting down next to her and giving her a big hug. She was a good dog.
But now she's gone. I've often complained that the worst thing about living in a dorm is you can't have a dog. But I think the worst thing now is that I won't be able to hug her when I go home for spring break.
A sparrow can't fall without God seeing, so His eye is probably on the great big lumbering Bernese mountain dogs of the world, too.
This is Kandy. Kandy's a Bernese mountain dog. My family had her for about five years. She was one of those giant dogs that thinks she's small enough to sit in your lap. She made an excellent pillow, and if you spent any amount of time loving her, she'd love you forever and ever.
I'm an animal person. My mom is a veterinarian technician, and I've worked at two vet clinics walking dogs and cleaning kennels. We now have two dogs and a cat at home, and I love both dogs and cats. The special thing about dogs, though, is how much they love people. They may be stupid or smart, obedient or ill-behaved, pretty or scraggly, but a dog that's been well cared for almost always loves its master unconditionally. Kandy was excellent at that. On a bad day, there were few things as comforting for me as sitting down next to her and giving her a big hug. She was a good dog.
But now she's gone. I've often complained that the worst thing about living in a dorm is you can't have a dog. But I think the worst thing now is that I won't be able to hug her when I go home for spring break.
A sparrow can't fall without God seeing, so His eye is probably on the great big lumbering Bernese mountain dogs of the world, too.
I sing because I'm happy
I sing because I'm free
I sing because I'm free
His eye is on the sparrow,
And I know He watches over me.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Nice
Perhaps it's odd, but I'm always surprised when anyone tells me I'm a nice person. I don't think I'm a horrible person, and I know I'm not really a mean person. But I am a fairly antisocial person, and whenever I act friendly and polite just because I should I feel like I've somehow tricked everyone.
Right now, I'm surrounded by nice people. An overwhelming mosh pit of friendly, caring, genuine and loving people. It's almost terrifying. And it's welcome weekend, which means I am constantly doing activities with these terrifyingly fantastic people.
I came to Taylor knowing, at least in my head, that I was going to change and grow. But I kept those thoughts separate from the rest of me that thinks I like being a lonely person who tells no one anything and fixes everything herself. When I think of it like that, I can again tell myself I'm not a horrible person. Disaster averted. But it's one short slip and a fall from there to condescension, then looking down on others, and all sorts of secret sins which are so easy to slip into.
Maybe this was buzzing in the back of my mind as I tried to smile and be nice to everyone yesterday and decided I couldn't. I was tired. I wanted to be alone. I was trying not to cry all through the afternoon, and by the time we had all-campus communion, I could only think Please God, help.
I wanted to not only be nice, but love the people around me as I knew they loved me. I could tell, because all the wonderful girls from my dorm took care of me. One prayed for me to have peace. And I found it.
Today is another stressful day, but it's been tempered with understanding. I have to come to rely on the people around me, and more importantly on God. I should have figured out by now that I can't do this on my own. It's not about being nice. It's not about trying to smile. I just need to love these people for who they are -- which is easy enough.
Right now, I'm surrounded by nice people. An overwhelming mosh pit of friendly, caring, genuine and loving people. It's almost terrifying. And it's welcome weekend, which means I am constantly doing activities with these terrifyingly fantastic people.
I came to Taylor knowing, at least in my head, that I was going to change and grow. But I kept those thoughts separate from the rest of me that thinks I like being a lonely person who tells no one anything and fixes everything herself. When I think of it like that, I can again tell myself I'm not a horrible person. Disaster averted. But it's one short slip and a fall from there to condescension, then looking down on others, and all sorts of secret sins which are so easy to slip into.
Maybe this was buzzing in the back of my mind as I tried to smile and be nice to everyone yesterday and decided I couldn't. I was tired. I wanted to be alone. I was trying not to cry all through the afternoon, and by the time we had all-campus communion, I could only think Please God, help.
I wanted to not only be nice, but love the people around me as I knew they loved me. I could tell, because all the wonderful girls from my dorm took care of me. One prayed for me to have peace. And I found it.
Today is another stressful day, but it's been tempered with understanding. I have to come to rely on the people around me, and more importantly on God. I should have figured out by now that I can't do this on my own. It's not about being nice. It's not about trying to smile. I just need to love these people for who they are -- which is easy enough.
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