LOVE SUFFERS

Ezra 10:1-44; 1 Corinthians 6:1-20; Psalm 31:9-18; Proverbs 21:3

“While Ezra prayed and made this confession, weeping and lying face down on the ground in front of the Temple of God, a very large crowd of people from Israel—men, women, and children—gathered and wept bitterly with him.”

“Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body.”

“Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am in distress. Tears blur my eyes. 
My body and soul are withering away. I am dying from grief; my years are shortened by sadness. Sin has drained my strength; I am wasting away from within.”

“The Lord is more pleased when we do what is right and just than when we offer him sacrifices.”

Here is some hard truth. Love hurts. Love grieves. In short, love suffers. Not all the time, of course, but if love is really love, it must be willing to suffer any time suffering is required. A love not willing to sacrifice to save another is not worthy of the name. No emotional attachment that starts packing when the going gets tough bears any resemblance to what happened on Calgary. No, when the road is rocky, love toughs it out. Even Love may stumble, to be sure, against the onslaughts of the Evil One. However, in spite of the pain, love suffers through. Love does not turn back. Most important, love is not afraid to be love for fear of love’s inevitable pain. Love looks for opportunities to triumph through the pain.

I’m not sure I ever fully understood how truly painful love can be in this life until I watched my wife suffer through the death of her father. His loss was a shock to us all, but for my wife, it was more than personal. It was a full frontal spiritual and emotional attack by the one enemy who cannot be denied on human terms. Moreover, her service as Executrix prevented her from grieving fully as her heart longed to do. Through the entire year plus aftermath of clearing the Estate and doing her best to keep all the heirs happy, my wife kept a stiff upper lip and suffered more or less in silence. Still, suffer she did. Fundamentally unequipped to handle the technical legalities that tied up the Estate and everyone’s emotions, she had to face stinging criticism from those who felt slighted by the Will or when unforeseen delays caused stress or suspicions to raise their ugly heads. More than once, we discussed her resignation. At times, I was pretty forceful in virtually insisting on it. She stuck it out for one reason and one reason only: her Daddy had asked her to do it, even if from beyond the grave. Her obedience to her father’s Will was a living metaphor for what Love compels us to do in accord with our heavenly Father’s Will. Stick it out. Period. Love suffers. If we are to claim the role of true disciple, we’d best get used to the idea.

That love - and Love, for that matter - suffer has never been any secret or surprise. Love suffers because love makes itself vulnerable, even as it strives to be inexhaustible. From the very start in the Garden, our Creator understood and accepted the price of loving His Creation. We broke Abba’s heart by choosing to be like Him instead of choosing to live with Him. (It was, for sure, The Great Divorce, and there was nothing good about it.) After the flood, and at Mount Sinai, God surely wept for those who turned their backs on Him and had to face the necessary and unavoidable consequences of their sin. As His children were swept away to Babylon, how difficult it must have been for Him to walk alongside yet be unable to touch their stubborn, cold and defeated hearts. I am told (fortunately, having never experienced either) that even more difficult than losing a spouse is the loss of a child. Yet, throughout history, our Father has continued to suffer that unspeakable pain, because He continues to love us. Because that’s what love does. Love suffers.

Even more disturbingly, I have come to believe there is a point of suffering beyond which human love simply cannot go. Questions about commitment aside, I know some marriages break up just because a spouse’s love is simply spent.  A common question – expressed or unexpressed – in many human relationships where love is cherished remains, “How do I love through THAT?!?” Whatever “THAT” may be, we are fools to think we can love through it on our own. Again, I found my answer through my wife’s example. She essentially made it through by giving up. In desperation and exhaustion, she just collapsed into the waiting, loving arms of her Savior. She let Christ take the slings and arrows as He compassionately protected her with His own Body (to the shame of her husband, I should honestly add). Then, curiously, at some point, she almost was literally resurrected. She was given a strength and peace that did indeed pass all understanding, and she developed a reliance on the Holy Spirit I find hard to fathom, even these years later. Her sacrifice and suffering made her a better lover of everyone she comes in contact with today. In submitting herself to the fire, she found virtually all of whatever was not of Love in her (there were few problems to begin with) burned away. She had no choice but to rely on Christ’s love working through her. It was a very worthwhile sacrifice and one that continues to stand as an example for her husband, especially.

So, today, Good Friday, let us confront the Cross with Christ, not as a mere bystander. See how Love really suffers. Look at the price that was paid for our souls, up close and personal. We could run away, afraid to witness the death of Love. We could turn our heads and just pretend to experience His ultimate Passion for us, but it would be a shallow thing. Or, we can accept His invitation to come near. Touch His broken body. Hear His anguish. Even let His Blood rain down on us, covering us in its crimson stain. Wince at the sound of the spear piercing His side. Sympathize with His parched throat and slow suffocation. Reach for the hammer that drove the nails through His bones and cartilage into the wood. But above all, stay to the end. Claim His strength to do so. Only then will we hear His final Words. “Father… forgive them…. It is finished.” See, love’s suffering will not last forever. There is hope. But for today, let each of us just stand at His bleeding feet and ask an age-old question. What wondrous love is this?