LOVE CHANGES EVERYTHING

1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13

Sunday, January 28, 2007

She remembers growing up angry. She was angry with her sister because she seemed to be so perfect. She was angry with her parents because they seemed to agree with the charade. She was so angry in high school that, when an older man asked her to marry him, she quit school and married him just to get away from the anger.

Of course, the anger followed her, because it was hers and not theirs. The anger destroyed her marriage, leaving her finally on the streets of Kansas City, living in her car with her child. She figures it was love for her child that finally moved her past the anger. She rehearsed the speech she would give to her parents so that her child would have a home.

When she called home, her mother answered. Her mother wouldn’t let her say those words she’d rehearsed so carefully, only asking where she was so her father could come pick her up. She was welcome home—so much so that her dad drove from Columbia, Missouri to bring her and her child home. She remembers thinking that this must be what that unconditional love was that she’d heard about in Sunday school.

Another story of a woman. She, too, grew up angry. Her anger was directed toward God because her father, the real target of her anger, wouldn’t allow her to direct it toward him. She understood God to be angry, judgmental and intent on holding people up to a measure they could never meet—and so she understood Him to be cruel. Her father was a pastor, so she turned her back on church when she turned her back on God and her father.

By the time she got to Denver, she had adopted three children, hoping to build the family life she’d not known. She learned to ignore the glares and stares of judgment she got from people as a single mom with three children. Her anger had let her build a wall around her family to keep everyone out.

She started a job where a member of a church worked. A friendship developed and her friend invited her to come to her church one Sunday. She agreed, but decided to leave her children in the care of another because she was certain of the glares and didn’t want to risk the rejection. The preacher preached a sermon with the outrageous title, “Hurrah for babies that cry in church.” She heard about love rather than cruelty from God. She heard an invitation rather than rejection. God’s love changed everything.

Jesus tells the story of a young man who was angry with his father and brother. So he demanded his share of the family estate and went of to make his way. You know the story of the prodigal son. You know he squandered his inheritance and decided to come home with a rehearsed speech. You know how the father met him, welcomed him home—how the Father’s love changed everything.

Love changes everything.

This title is not original with me. One of the department stores used it during their Christmas advertising campaign last year. I’d like to think, because I’ve heard about the family behind this department store chain—that they are active in their faith and church and so, also their community—that they chose this motto with the intent of pointing to the same love Paul writes to the Corinthians about—the one love that we meet in the Father’s sending His Son.

We live in a culture that is both love-hungry and love-saturated. We really don’t know what love is—so we don’t know what it is when He finds us. C. S. Lewis identifies four loves in his essay. He writes about affection, friendship, romance and charity. This last love, charity, is the same love Paul writes of—the love that gives of itself for others. He calls it the greatest love.

We agree with him and each of us can no doubt think of an example of someone who loved this way. Perhaps a parent or grandparent, perhaps someone like Mother Theresa comes to mind. We are amazed at these people and their displays of love because we know they are heroic—they are not commonplace. Even in these we name, we recognize that their love was not always so giving—it didn’t never end as Paul writes of this love. Our love is finally incomplete.

So there must be another source, if it is not us. John uses the same word Paul uses—although Paul makes it a noun and John uses the verb—to talk about the love the Father has for the world that moved Him to send the Son. This love that the women—and the prodigal—mentioned above met in their stories, that received and blessed them is the Father’s love for us in Jesus.

This love sent the Son to be born a human in Bethlehem. As I said, the story is familiar—so familiar that we risk not listening, to our ruin. This love that Jesus has for us took Him willingly to His cross to die in our place—our sin earned death and judgment, because we don’t meet His measure. He died for you and me. He rose to open the possibility of this love in our lives—our stories, our eternities.

The One Love the Father has for us in the Son changes our love. Paul speaks of “love” as a noun as he writes to the Corinthians, but love is a verb. Love does. Love trusts, believes, hopes. Martin Luther described this same action when he writes about the opportunities we have in the Eighth Commandment—to put the best construction on everything.

Love does, and as it does, it points away from our selves. It points to others to identify their needs and ways love can be shown to them. It points to Jesus as the Maker of our love and as the Source for this love that unfolds in our actions.

His love changes us. We live in an “instant” world. We can turn on the television and see event unfold on the other side of the world. We can cook food in seconds and eat it even faster, it seems. We are always in a hurry. Love changes us from people who can’t wait into people who know patience. We become people who are with one another for the long term—we bear one another’s burdens. We endure—we know that the moment isn’t all there is, there is God behind and beyond the moment, so we have hope.

His love changes how we see things and one another and how we love one another. Your job or your life at school is changed from simple obligation to get the job done or get paid to something you and I do because we are loved by God and want to glorify Him. We do these things for Him.

How we see strangers is transformed by His love. Strangers are changed from simply being people in our way to people for whom Christ died. If He so loves them, we can, too. They are people who need to have Jesus rewrite their stories with His love and we can speak those words of His love.

Our brothers and sisters in Christ are likewise changed. More than simply those people we sit near in church—and maybe remember their names!—our fellow members are people with whom we are connected and blessed by the Spirit to care for and serve with. We look for opportunities to connect with them. Connect with someone you haven’t before today and see what blessings they are.

Finally, His love changes us, but doesn’t change. Paul ends his discourse on love with the words that faith, hope and love abide, but the greatest of these is love. How can he write so?

Faith is that given to us that trusts that God’s promises are true. In the face of all we face, we trust in what we cannot see. In heaven, we will no longer see through the mirror dimly, we shall see face to face. Faith is completed in heaven and something else will shape us. Likewise, hope waits for fulfillment, trusting and looking past what is seen to what is coming. Hope, too, will be completed in heaven.

Love remains unchanged. Obviously, we’re talking about something other than that human emotion, love. That falls under C.S. Lewis’ other categories. The love that moved the Father to send the Son is the same love that called you to be His own and that loves you now and will be the same love you meet face to face in heaven. You and I can trust His love.

Hear the invitation in the stories mentioned above of people who met this love and who were changed by this love. Trust in His love and He holds you in it. Hear also in Paul’s words to the Corinthians to not trust in those things that are passing away, trust in what remains—His love for you in Christ.

Love is a Person, not just an emotion. That Person is Jesus and His love changes everything. He holds you in His love now and forever. Let go of whatever keeps you from His love and, by His Spirit’s gifts, let His love hold you. Trust in His trustworthy love and let Him change you and everything.