Pondering Love

I trust that your preparations for Christmas have gone well. In fact, it would please me greatly if this article becomes part of that preparation.

The four traditional words for Advent are hope, peace, joy, and love. I have been considering each word in succession at Cross~Wind.

I want to share just a bit around the theme of love. We sing songs about it. Many think of it largely as romance. Yet, when we think of love coming down at Christmas, we are thinking of something quite different.

If we step back for a moment, and remember that the original language of our New Testament is Greek, we might receive some help. “Love” has several Greek words that have differing nuances. The most obvious is that one of the words refers to the affection we might find between friends. However, I want to focus on agape, which refers to a conscious evaluation and choice that result in concern and interest in the other. It suggests sincere appreciation and high regard for the other.

Can you name a time that you experienced undeserved love?

            Think of it this way. To love, agape, is to begin reflecting upon our moral relationship to the other. Love embraces the other. Love means that something matters, moving against our nagging suspicion that nothing matters. In fact, a moral sickness or malady is to move toward apathy and isolation. Love heals that sickness. It suggests knowledge of the other. It helps the other. Love points the way toward that which we hope. Love is joyful acceptance of the other. To love is to suggest that what is truly valuable is beyond or outside me. To love is to move beyond what the law requires. We become loving people. Our capacity to love is the affirmation of our own life, happiness, growth, and freedom. The Old Testament Law found its reaffirmation in the second of the two great commandments Jesus identified: Love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus defined this love in the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:29ff. Such love involves caring and thoughtful action toward the other; not just warm feelings you may or may not have toward the other.

            Let us apply such reflections to the Christmas story. How much love did Mary and Joseph display?

Carlo Carretto tells of visiting a village among the Arab people.  It was not long until he became acquainted with the Tuaregs, who lived in tents along a rocky basin where water surfaced.  A girl in the camp where he stayed had been betrothed to a boy in another camp.  She had not gone to live with him because he was too young.  Joseph, he remembered, was betrothed to Mary, but they were not living together.  Two years later, he came back to the camp.  During conversation around the campfire, he asked if the marriage had taken place yet.  There was awkward silence.  He did not pursue the subject.  Later, he asked a friend from the camp what the silence meant.  He looked cautiously around.  Because he trusted Carlo Carretto as a man of God, he made a sign, passing his hand under his chin.  It meant that she had her throat cut.  The reason?  Before, the wedding it was discovered that the girl was pregnant.  In what sociologists call an honor and shame culture, she betrayed her family. It required her sacrifice. For Carlo Carretto, a shiver went through him as he thought of a girl being killed because she had not been faithful to her future husband (Blessed are you who Believed).

The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out of love, and to let it come in. When we love, we are in tune with, for God is love. Love binds Father, Son, and Spirit, with the Spirit inviting us to participate in this love. Prayer is an expression of love to God and neighbor. Yes, God loves this world, and we join God in that love.

We in the church have this wonderful opportunity to share the love God has for this world. The hearts of people will never be as open as they are now.