REFOCUS
Begin with two minutes of silence. Breathe deeply while you focus on God being with you (even if you can’t sense His presence right now).
READ
1 John 3: 1, 11, 14, 16-18
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! . . .
11 For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another . . .
14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death.
16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters.
17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?
18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
John 4:19–21
We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.
John 15: 12-14
This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you.
REFLECT
Harsh and Dreadful Love
It is fashionable, especially among religious folks, to talk of love. It would be an unusual person indeed who wouldn’t see loving as a wonderful goal. And yet Dostoevsky’s classic story, “The Brothers Karamazov,” illustrates how difficult love can be. It reminds the reader that loving often means making hard choices – ones we may not want to make.
In the story, Dostoevsky writes – about a wealthy woman who, in her search for God, visits an elderly monk. The monk tells the woman that he can’t give her an airtight intellectual argument that will prove God’s existence to her. The proof, he tells her, will instead arise in her heart as she begins to love and serve others. If she will begin to actively love others, God will become real to her. She will know His presence and character through loving service.
As the woman considers what he has said, she remembers that she has, in fact, sometimes felt drawn toward dedicating her life to God. She envisions herself taking vows of poverty in order to serve the poor. Yet, as she begins to focus on the joy of a new life, one of serving others and finding God, another thought interrupts her commitment: She imagines the people she will be serving and realizes that some might not recognize her caring. Some might even be ungrateful. They might even complain – that the bread she has sacrificed to bring them is stale or that the soup isn’t warm enough. Perhaps they would return her kindness with entitlement or even contempt.
These thoughts are too much for her to bear. The good intentions she had at first are overcome by the awareness that she could never face that kind of disrespect. In a moment she is back where she began – her dreams of serving God and others are dashed and she is, once again, wondering if there is really a God.
Reflecting on her condition, the wise monk says, “Love in practice is a harsh and dreadful thing – compared with love in dreams.” The wise monk knew that it is much easier to love in dreams, thought and words than in real life. Practicing love requires sacrifice and that, in turn, requires emotional and spiritual maturity.
This passage from 1 John tells us that it is impossible to love God unless we love one another. John also reminds us that to God, love is not simply thoughts or words. No matter how lofty or sweet they sound, love is found not in words but in action. Moreover, it is found in sacrificial action. Jesus stands as the prime example of love as He “lays down His life” for us. By His “harsh and dreadful” sacrifice, we know what love is. This makes God real to those who seek Him. No lofty words or thoughts can measure spiritual maturity. True spirituality is found in following His command: to love as He did.
RESPOND
Questions to Consider
- Think about some of the people you interact with daily. How would you like to see God revealed in those relationships?
- What “harsh and dreadful things” might love require from you in these relationships?
Prayer
Lord Jesus, I am tempted to substitute thoughts and words of love for the call to real, sacrificial love. I receive Your commandment to love along with your example of what that means. May Your love so fill me that I love as You did, and through that love, know and practice Your presence, character, and pleasure. Amen.
Blessings,
Rev. James R. Needham, PhD, MDiv