Background Scripture: John 3:16 Meditation Scriptures: I Corinthians 13; I John 3: 1-3, 16-18
"...Love is not loveWhich alters when it alteration finds..." ~William Shakespeare, Sonnet CXVI
I've always liked that line. I remember when my sister was in high school and she was trying to memorize that sonnet for her English Lit class. She would repeat the lines over and over, but she always got stuck on the"O, No!" part. I would laugh and laugh. But she finally got it, and in spite of my giggling, I came to believe that The Bard was on to something, whether he realized it or not.
True love. Real love. Sweet love. It's "What the World Needs Now." It's what the world has always needed. It's what we all want. It's what earns greeting card writers, candy makers, and florists their livelihoods, especially during the month of February! Some people spend their entire lives in search of this love. Others spend most of their lives trying to revive dying love. Sadly, others live out their lives lamenting lost love. If truth be told, we've all been there before. But God, in His infinite wisdom, has His own way of reminding us that we have already experienced something far greater than what Shakespeare could ever imagine. We have known Perfect Love. People say "what's from the heart reaches the heart." This may be trite, but it's true. When we stop to remember how the heart of our Father has already reached out to each of us in the person of Jesus, we should feel blessed. We need never long for love again.
"Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us..."(I John 3: 1). Imagine, if you will, that you adopt some 15 children, and that you love them and rear them from birth as though they were your very own. You give them every advantage, every material, emotional, and spiritual resource at your disposal. You provide everything you believe they will need to become healthy, productive adults. They are still toddlers when miraculously, you and your spouse conceive a child after years and years of unsuccessful attempts. Your children grow up together, but as they become teenagers, something awful happens. One by one, the adopted children begin to reject all your teaching and guidance. They spurn your affection and caring. They begin to experiment with drugs, and they start to commit crimes, first petty theft, then more serious ones. They become verbally and physically abusive to you, and worse, they become particularly hostile toward your natural child. They begin to turn their aggressions outward toward your friends, and in the end, they conspire to commit a robbery of an elderly neighbor in order to obtain money to buy drugs. Your neighbor is killed in the robbery, and now all 15 of the children are in jail.
You are heartbroken, not only by what they have done, but also by the knowledge that your children will be tried as adults and that they will fact the death penalty if they are convicted. Despite your appeals, there is but one offer of leniency from the prosecution. The youngsters will be remanded to Youth Court for probation and counseling, and they will even receive treatment for chemical dependency. But there is a condition. It seems that the 15 have implicated your natural child in the crime. Though you know that he is innocent, the 15 have named him as the mastermind of their conspiracy, and in order to gain the pardon for them, you must surrender him to the authorities. He will be tried as an adult, and because he has no alibi for the time of the crime, he is certain to be convicted and sentenced to death. Incredibly, he says that he is willing to go to jail, even to his death, in order to save his brothers and sisters. Do you, can you love the 15 enough to sacrifice your own flesh and blood for their sake?
Now in reality, this scenario could never play out in quite the way I have described. But even so, it pales by comparison to what God did for us. No doubt you know the story. But perhaps you've never thought of "love" in this manner. What kind of love is this? This is true love. It has no bounds. It knows no shame. It does not change with the changing times. It does not take "time out" for bad behavior. It does not fade or wither like even the loveliest roses will do. It will not spoil like candy. It does not yellow and cumple with time, like a love letter or a Valentine card. It is unconditional love...it is the love for which every heart longs until it finds its place in God. It is love that anyone can experience, if one knows where to look. It is love anyone can feel, if we let it flow from one heart to another.
Know that God loves you. Live His love within you. See His love all around you. Speak His love to those near you. Show His love to those who seem to be beyond you. It can happen. We can all have true love.
