I have been
studying the classical prophets, the men sent by God to disturb the comfortable
and comfort the disturbed. While
examining the “Book of Amos,” I finally understood why God punished all the
nations that disobeyed and turned against Him.
He did so out of love, to guide and bring back to goodness His
beloved. We usually associate love with
joy, with getting our way; but, God’s Word teaches us that love while it produces
good feelings it’s quite a serious commitment.
It’s not something that comes natural- many times we find ourselves needing
to choose to love especially when we are hurting and it feels so darn
unnatural. The prophet Amos goes out
into the many tribes, telling the people that they have turned against God that
their ways have created separation between themselves and God. He warns them to return to God, to repent of
their sin and to remember their story of deliverance but they refuse to
listen. So, God uses tough love to get
them back in the right path. We forget
that love wants the best for the beloved and sometimes the best requires a form
of tough love. A good parent disciplines
his child when the child needs guidance.
Good parents don’t stand by and allow their children to walk in a
destructive path. Thus, love means making tough choices for the well-being of the
beloved.
I was
reading an article about how many single people have this erroneous view that
love comes naturally and effortlessly.
Yet, if we look at our Christian faith we see the opposite. Love is hard! Just examine the popular verse
in Corinthians, the verse often recited at weddings and we begin to see that
love requires practice and a lifetime of learning. “Love is patient, love is kind; love is not
envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
It doesn’t insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful, it
does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in truth. It bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.” If I were to substitute my name where
love is, I wouldn’t get very far, “Penny is patient, Penny is kind…” I would fail right at the start because I
lose my patience (some days quicker than others) and when I am hurt I just
think of protecting myself and not about being kind. Most everything requires a great deal of
discipline, effort and practice. If we
want to become great athletes or performers we need to invest a great deal
because developing skills always requires effort and commitment. Thus, if trivial things like becoming great
athletes requires work how can we say that love doesn’t require even more
dedication. In scripture we see that
love is more than a beautiful feeling that comes from our hearts, real love is
a choice that requires action (love heals, forgives, provides, communicates,
befriends…). It’s not an everlasting
pink feeling, but a sacrificial choice that many times steps all over our pride
and delivers us from selfishness. It’s an
active doing that doesn’t depend on
feeling, but on choice. That doesn’t mean that love is devoid of emotion- it
just means that we must act like Christians even if our feelings betray us.
LOL
Love is
hard that’s why we need to abide in God, to get our strength from Him and even
invite Him to love through us when we feel incapable of doing it. We also need
to practice loving every day so that we can become better lovers. We need to remain connected to the source of
love through prayer. To talk to Him
about our personal struggles and ask Him for guidance. In the narratives of the classical prophets
we see that love is hard. God had to use
tough love to get Israel back on the right path, but we also learn that tough
love is always controlled by a soft heart. Read Chapter Elven verse eight
through nine in the “Book of Hosea.” In those two verses God says, I won’t destroy
you because my love is greater than my anger. I am God, the Holy One, who can
control my wrath and behave like God.
Even though God exercises tough love on His chosen people and even
though He disciplines them - above all He loves them! These Old Testament narratives teach us that
love is not easy, that sometimes love doesn’t feel good, that sometimes it feels
like we are being punished- but love straightens our paths and corrects our behavior
in hopes of making us better versions of ourselves.
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