True Love is...

I am reading a book called "Sex God" by Rob Bell, Pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church. As I say on the sidebar, don't be shocked by the title and certainly don't judge this book by its cover. I am going to share a passage from the book that really struck me about what true love is and how God demonstrated that to us. In light of tomorrow being Valentine's Day I think it is a good call:)

"The story the Bible tells is of a living being who loves and who continues to love even when that love is not returned. A God who refuses to override our freedom, who respects our power to decide whether to reciprocate, a God who lets us make the next move.

Love is handing your heart to someone and taking the risk that they will hand it back because they don't want it. That's why it's such a crushing ache on the inside. We gave away a part of ourselves and it wasn't wanted.

Love is a giving away of power. When we love, we give the other person the power in the relationship. They can do what they choose. They can do what they like with our love. They can reject it, they can accept it, they can step toward us in gratitude and appreciation.

Love is a giving away. When we love, we put ourselves out there, we expose ourselves, we allow ourselves to be vulnerable.

Love is giving up control. It's surrendering the desire to control the other person. The two - love and controlling power over the other person - are mutually exclusive. If we are serious about loving someone, we have to surrender all of the desires within us to manipulate the relationship.

So if you were God - which I realize is an odd way to begin a sentence - but if you were God, the all-powerful creator of the universe, and you wanted to move toward people, you wanted to express your love for the world in a new way, how would you do it?....

If you're God and you want to express ultimate love to your creation, if you want to move toward them in a definitive way, you have a problem, because just showing up overwhelms people.

You wouldn't come as you are.

You wouldn't come in strength.

You wouldn't come in your pure, raw essence. You'd scare everybody away.

The last thing people would perceive is love.

So how would you express your love in an ultimate way? How do you connect with people in a manner that wouldn't scare them off but would compel them to want to come closer, to draw nearer?

You would need to strip yourself of all of the trappings that come with ultimate power and authority. That's how love works. It doesn't matter if a man has a million dollars and wants to woo a woman, if she loves him for his money, it isn't really love.

If you were an almighty being who made the universe and everything in it, you would need to meet people on their level, in their world, on their soil...like them.

This is the story of the Bible. This is the story of Jesus. ...

His (Jesus') entire life is about the stripping away of power and control. Jesus always chooses the path of love, not power. Inclusion, not exclusion. Connection and solidarity rather than rank and hierarchy. Touch rather than distance. Compassion rather than control. He comes on a donkey, not a horse. Weeping and broken, not proud and triumphant."

I'll stop here before I quote the whole book:) It just struck me in a fresh way how much God loves us that He would send Jesus to be on our level to connect with us. Just as in earthly relationships where we can move toward or away from someone, we can do the same with Jesus. And yet He never stops loving us and never turns away. Talk about amazing love!

I encourage you to read this book. Perhaps it will impact you as it is impacting me.