In my own little way, I had been trying to
reflect on the love of Christ with the verse from John 13:34-35 “Love one
another as I had loved you”. So many things had been said about love, but did
we really try to fathom the depths of Christ love, the height and breathe of
His faithfulness?
The Name of Love
Love is not just the character of God, nor is
it just the nature of Him. Love is the name of God Himself. He loves us first,
not the other way around. His love does not depend on us loving back, because
He is love. The beauty is that God has gifted us with the will, so that we
could freely choose to love Him back. So our love then, is not a coerced love,
or love just based on obedience or fear, but out of our own free will flowing
from our heart.
Loving Beyond
The problem we have is that we confused love
with mere feelings. Sometimes our understanding of love is a love that does not
get angry. We say it is love when there is no anger. We usually say, "May
sasabihin ako ha, pero huwag kang magalit. (I
have something to say but please don’t get mad at me.)" We say this
because we don't want to hurt someone. But
the opposite of love is not hate or anger, but indifference. The truth
is, if we love, we will get hurt. The
person that we love the most is the person that would hurt us the most. Kapag
wala kanang pakialam, hindi kana nasasaktan (If
you don’t care, you won’t get hurt anymore).
The two kinds of love:
1. Romantic love – This is when we see what is beautiful of
the beloved. Conversations such us, "Anak, huwag yan, ni hindi yan
nagsisimba (Son, please not her, she’s
not even a mass goer)." And the son replies, "Okay lang po Nay,
maganda naman (It’s okay Mom, anyway
she’s beautiful)." Or take this another example, "Bestfriend, ang
panget naman ng buhok niya. (Bestfriend, he has a very horrible hair)."
And the reply is, "Okay lang, magaling naman mag gitara. (It’s okay he is
good at playing guitar anyway)."
2. Mature
love – This is
when we see beyond what is beautiful of the beloved. When someone asks, "Pag nagalit ako, maiintindihan mo ba na
mahal pa rin kita? (If I get angry, will you still understand that I still love
you?) Mature love replies, "I
know and my eyes are open that you have these weaknesses and I love you
nevertheless."
So our love then should go beyond feelings
and emotions. It must rise above what the eyes can see but what the heart can
see. So when we relate to God in love,
we will love Him not because He will get angry if we don’t, or we are afraid of
punishment, because if that is so, then it is not mature love but love that is
still in the level of feelings and emotions. We love God because we firmly
believe that He loves us so much that He died for us.
A Thousand Times
When we look at the
cross, we can always hear the voice that says, “I will do this a thousand times
for you.” 1 Corinthians 13 affirms that His love bears all things, believes all
things, endures all things and hopes all things. So confronted with human
weaknesses and frailties we can always look at the other and say yes, if He can do it, I can do it too.
A reflection during the making of
the 2008 YFC ILC, edited and added some present notes.
by aats