Thursday, September 18, 2014

The measure of love

In the fifth grade, there was Brenda. I had fallen as fifth-grade in love as one could fall. Like ice on a wintry day, I fell hard and froze when it counted.

I could not talk to Brenda, couldn't even gargle a couple of words out when we first met. It was as if Cupid had shot an arrow into my tongue, pinning it to the top of my deathly dry mouth. She appeared, a transfer of some kind as I recall, and suddenly the shy fifth-grader who cared more, much more for baseball than girls was a Brenda-stalker.

Love had horse-collared me.

The sentiment is clear as fall rain water: God loves you, us, you and I. He loves us so much, he insured we would be able to see and feel this love. Get that? He wanted to make sure we would feel His love.

My parents loved me. I'm fairly sure about this. But their method of showing me involved buying me things.

Love equaled things, things bought, things given. In my opinion, then, that led me to getting pretty much everything I ever asked for, which led me to ask for everything I could think of, which led me to becoming more selfish than normal original-sin selfishness, which led me to ...

You get the idea, I suspect. I thought much more of myself than I did others, right on up to the time after I first met Him, really met Him.

The interesting thing to me is that He never GAVE me anything. No I-pads, no cars, no Saints championships, no Braves World Series wins. Oh, they got those things, and I was part of the receiving line for championships. But no, I never swapped prayer championships with God.

Love does not equal purchases or gifts. You can't buy yourself into being loved more. You can't insure you're going to be loved by your actions. You can't give because you want someting in return. Love happens, and many times it does not. Often, you can't make an emotion happen in the manner in which you would like it to happen.

Brenda was, well, Brenda. Perfect skin. Perfect eyes, deep and brown and swimable if you know what I mean. Hair wispy and dirty blonde. She was my fifth-grade ideal.

Let's put it this way: The greatest emotion I've felt during the 19 year of rebirth has been my time in prison ministry, followed closely by my time in Cursillo -- a three-day event. There are ties between the two events, both are very planned events. In other words, the events are closely monitored so you know where you are supposed to be at such and such time all weekend. The truth is I would love to feel what I felt during those events, spiritually and emotionally, all the time. I would love to feel the way I felt the first time I saw Brenda, but that's not possible.

And I'm good with that. I would rather spend a lifetime with my dear partner Mary than a fifth-grade class with Brenda. I would rather spend a lifetime with Jesus than three days with prisoners.

If you are counting on that emotionl reaction to continue the rest of your life, you're going to be fairly disappointed. The kicker is this: Love is not an emotion. It is not a momentary event. It is a matathon,  not a happy, happy sprint.

Paul said it this way: "Love never gives us. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn't want what it doesn't have. Love doesn't strut. Doesn't have a swelled head. Doesn't force itself on others. Isn't always 'me first.' Doesn't fly off the handle, doesn't keep score of the sins of others, doesn't revel when others grovel, takes pleasure in the flowering of truth. Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, always looks for the best, never looks back."

God loves me; this I know. For the Bible tells me so.

Love is.

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