Love is. by Rev. Kathy Sides (Preached at Fort Des Moines 2-3-2013) Whenever I read the 13 th chapter of first Corinthians, a song we sang in the New Life Singers 37 years ago now, comes to mind. It s the Love Theme and it s from a cantata called Spirit of 76 by Paul Johnson. Much of it is a paraphrase of what Paul writes of love. It doesn t really say anything new, but it says it a little differently. The words go like this: Love Theme by Paul Johnson Love is more than speaking words of eloquence; Love is more than knowledge can express. Love is not the fruit of man s intelligence; Love is not religious holiness. Love is more than feelings of emotion; Love s not just a four-letter word. Love is more than human devotion; Love s the sweetest story ever heard. For love is always patient, loyal and true. Love will never selfishly pursue. Love will not uncover the wrong in review. Love abides when others are untrue. Love can bear rejection and injustice; Love has faith when everything goes wrong. Love can face a million broken promises. And forever there will be, always faith, hope, and love; But the greatest of them all is love. In Paul s first letter to the Corinthians he says in no uncertan terms that love is everything. That it doesn t matter who we are or what we say or what we do. If we don t have love then we are nothing. Those are pretty powerful words. And pretty challenging sometimes. The Bible has a lot to say about love. A brief search on the computer showed the Bible (at least the Revised Standard Version of the Bible) uses the word love 492 times. It would take hours to find and read all of the passages that use the word love. But I think almost everything it says about love can be divided into three categories, three truths about love. 1
Number 1: We are to love God: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. Number 2: We are to love others: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Number 3: (and maybe sometimes this is the most difficult to believe, and to remember day to day) God loves us: For God so loved the world that he gve his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Those are important things to know and remember about love. But I believe that number three is the most important. Because unless we know and believe with all our heart that God loves us, the other two are impossible. It is God s love for us that makes it possible for us to love. If we cannot believe that God loves us, then we will never, no matter hard we try, be really successful at loving. Because loving, real loving, isn t always easy. It takes strength, and selflessness, and love. And those things come from God. Knowing we are unconditionally loved by God sets us free and empowers us to love others. Really love others. Even when it hurts. Sometimes it is easy and wonderful to love others. But we all know that sometimes it s not. Sometimes loving hurts. There are times when we may feel the fool for having loved. When someone takes our love lightly; when someone takes advantage of, or uses our love; when someone does not love us in return; or worst of all, when someone betrays our love. And at times like that we may feel like we never want to love again. Because it takes so much of our heart and soul and there are no guarantees that our love will be returned, or even appreciated. And, quite simply, because it hurts too much. But love that is truly love keeps on loving, in spite of hurt and disappointment and betrayal. Because: Love can bear rejection and injustice; Love has faith when everything goes wrong. Love can face a million broken promises.. Or as Paul originally put it, For love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. But we can only be brave enough to love with that kind of love if we know that we are loved. Deeply. Completely. By the God that created us. And, sometimes we have a hard time really knowing that. Or believing it day to day. Because we have this notion that God s love is something we have to earn or deserve. And we look at ourselves and know that most of the time we don t deserve that kind of love. But God doesn t love us because we deserve it, he just loves us. Period. I think Max Lucado puts it beautifully in his book, Just Like Jesus. He writes: 2
God loves you just the way you are. If you think his love for you would be stronger if your faith were, you are wrong. If you think his love would be deeper if your thoughts were, wrong again. Don t confuse God s love with the love of people. The love of peeople often increases with performance and decreases with mistakes. Not so with God s love. He loves you right where you are. God s love never ceases. Never. Though we spurn him. Ignore him. Reject him. Despise him. Disobey him. He will not change. Our evil cannot diminish his love. Our goodness cannot increase it. Our faith does not earn it anymore than our stupidity jeopardizes it. God doesn t love us less if we fail or more if we succeed. God s love never ceases. If we can get that into our heads, and more importantly, into our hearts; if we can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God loves us more than we can ever comprehend, and will keep on loving us no matter what we do, then we will find the capacity to love with the kind of love that Paul writes about. A love that Bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. A love that never ends. There are times when we forget just how important love is in our lives. We forget just how powerful it is, how much difference an action that shows our love can make in someone s life, how profoundly the words I love you can touch a heart. We neglect to commit ourselves to loving the way that we have been loved by the people that have loved us most. And more importantly, to loving the way we have are loved by God. We need to be reminded of the power of love. And to remember that sometimes a simple little gesture to show we care might make a world of difference in the life of someone who needs to know they are loved. I was reading through a Guidepost book entitled The Gift of Love this week. It is a collection of poems and stories about love. It reminded me again of how important it is that we find ways to share our love. To show our love. And how our love doesn t have to be expressed in big, elaborate ways. Sometimes a simple gesture of thoughtfulness can be a profound expression of love and care. I d like to close with a few of the things I read. In her story, Cathy Burden Griebner reminds as that love can be demonstrated by something as simple as Warm Cookies. She writes: 3
Warm Cookies by Cathy Burden Griebner Two years ago my daughter experienced the loss of a good friend, an elderly lady down the street whom she had adopted as her extra grandmother and was in the habit of stopping in to visit. She took the news of the sudden death first with tears, and then with protests of bitterness. Finally, she became maternal and began to worry about the elderly husband who was left alone. One day she decided to bake him some cookies, which had to be delivered while they were still warm. Because, Mom, she explained, anybody can buy homemade cookies, but only a wife can bring them warm from the oven for the first taste. Somehow I felt that my daughter possessed a wisdom far beyond her years in that simple explanation. And for me, the meaning of real thoughtfulness will always be rememberd in those two words, warm cookies. Two little poems remind us of the qualities and the power of love: Love Ever Gives by John Oxenham Love ever gives Forgives outlives and ever stands With open hands. And while it lives, It gives. For this is Loves s perogative To give, and give, and give. Thy Brother by Theodore Chickering Williams Share with him thy bread of blessing, Sorrow s burden share; When thy heart enfolds a brother, God is there. And finally, a story entitled You Love Me by Elizabeth Sherrill, that so powerfully tells us that when all is said and done, all we may remember is love. And that will be enough. 4
You Love Me by Elizabeth Sherrill I hadn t seen David and Marilyn since they retired and moved to Arizona, but through Christmas cards I d followed their ups and downs. For the past four years, since David was diagnosed as having Alzheimer s disease, I gathered that things had been pretty grim. Two months before a Guideposts assignment took meto Phoenix, Marilyn had at last placed him in a nursing home and that s where she and I were driving now. He won t know you, she warned as she parked in front of the Spanishstyle building. He doesn t know the children, anyone. She was right. There was no recognition in David s eyes as I gripped the passive hand on the arm of the wheelchair. But he was obviously well cared-for in the clean, cheery facility. It was Marilyn I was concerned about. Nothing on the Christmas cards had communicated the strain on her of these last four years. She was down to ninety-eitht pounds and badly stooped with arthritis, yet she was making this twelve-mile trip every day of the week to feed David his noonday meal. This is Tib, dear, she told him for the fifth or sixth time. Remember, we used to be neighbors? No Resonse. Who s this? She lifted a framed photograph of their daughter from the dresser. David stared at it, then shook his head. It was the same with pictures of their son, their grandchildren, their old collie. Marilyn lifted his hands from the chair arms, held them in both of hers and leaned close. Who am I, dear? That same bemused stare. Then his face brightened. For just a moment he looked like the David I remembered. You love me, he said. They were the only words he spoke during my visit. But what else, I thought, as the plane carried me back east, do we need to know? About one another. About God. When we don t know... when we can t understand.. when we re not sure of anything at all... we can still answer him with a joyful cry: You Love me. Even if we are sure of nothing else in this life, may be be able to say to God with confidence and joy, You love me! And may that love enliven and empower us to live in such a way that others will be able to look at us and say, You love me. May those we share our world and our lives with know us as one whose love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. One whose love never ends. Amen. 5