On Friday I was going through my old Bible and found the audio cd from our wedding. I have been looking for this cd pretty well since it was put into our hands, so I was thrilled to have found it. Since none of the pastors I follow have updated their podcasts (insert a "grrr") I decided I should listen to our wedding again.
Our pastor did an awesome job with our ceremony. I loved our vows and I loved his message on the verse we chose. The verse was Song of Songs 8:6-7:
Place me like a seal over your heart,
like a seal on your arm;
for love is as strong as death,
its jealousy unyielding as the grave.
It burns like blazing fire,
like a mighty flame.
Many waters cannot quench love;
rivers cannot sweep it away.
If one were to give
all the wealth of one’s house for love,
it would be utterly scorned.
Pastor Jeff talked about the role of a seal during this time period, how it symbolized a covenant. He talked about passion. About the rains that will come. About remembering that day and the vows we spoke.
Two years ago I was given Tim Keller's book The Meaning of Marriage. I read through it as a single person the year before that (borrowed it from my Dad) and was thoroughly challenged. Since getting married, Jordan and I are slowly working our way through it as well. I love our weekend mornings of breakfast with Tim Keller :) And I love the discussion that we get to have after reading a section.
On Saturday I can't say as I wanted to discuss what we were reading. See, it was one of those sections that applied beyond a husband and wife and to all of our relationships. Keller talked all about making a decision to love. He quotes CS Lewis who talked about how over the long haul we can change our hearts through our actions.
You see, last week wasn't a very good week for me with our tenants. I found myself growing frustrated with them and the lack of respect that they seem to have for us and our belongings. I had a run-in with one of them and where I think I handled it well, I know that attitude really wasn't what it should have been.
The whole time we were reading this section all I could feel was conviction over my actions and attitude. I know God has been challenging me to love our tenants and I was choosing to ignore that. When it came time to discuss what we had read I tried to blow it off a bit. Instead of being able to that, Jordan looks at me and says, "This was a good section. It reminds me a lot of what you have been writing about in your blog."
Yeah. Couldn't really run or hide from my conviction after that :) So with a great deal of prayer I am working on my attitude.
But this, among a few other things I have noticed lately, causes me to wonder: What is love?
I don't want to get into the debate, but I have seen a lot of action on my Facebook homepage with regards to two names: Mark Driscoll and Rob Bell. I definitely have an opinion but don't really feel like this is the post to get into that. What I do see is two different groups that tend to tear the men down. One group does so in the name of truth, while the other does in the name of love. What I find interesting is that in 1 Corinthians 13, in the infamous love passage, Paul says that "Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth" (verse 6).
When Nicodemus comes to Jesus in John 3, Jesus tells him that the only way to see the kingdom of God and experience eternal life is through Him. He tells him that He didn't come to condemn the world but to save it. Yet He also says that if you do not believe you stand condemned.
Multiple times throughout the Gospels, Jesus heals the sick and broken. He breaks the rules and heals on the Sabbath. He reaches out to the undesirables and critiques those in positions of religious authority. But do you know what He also tells those He heals? Repeatedly Jesus says to "Go and sin no more."
Somehow Jesus exemplifies love and truth functioning together. He speaks the harsh truth to the religious leaders (by the way, I'm pretty sure He still loves them even though what He says is hard. If He didn't love them He probably wouldn't go to the extremes He did to try to get through to them). He still spends time with those society has deemed as unclean and unwanted. But those people also leave His presence changed. He tells them to sin no more.
Does loving my tenants mean letting them do whatever they want? Allowing them to walk all over us, threaten us, etc? No. But it also doesn't mean that I condemn them. There is truth. There is love. How to combine both of those if what I am pondering. How do I show love in a way that allows them to see the truth of Christ?
So these are my ponderings three days before Christmas.
If I don't write before husband and I take off for BC on the 24th, then I wish you all a Merry Christmas!
No comments:
Post a Comment