romantic evening with incense and
candles and a nice dinner, but as her
husband drew her close to tell her how
beautiful she was, she pulled away—her
preparations weren’t finished. As she
rushed around the room, lighting candles
and dimming lights, he said softly, “Honey, I
don’t want candles. I want you.”
As I read, I thought, “Wow! What woman
doesn’t want to hear that?!” But I also
secretly identified with her response of
discomfort. She wrote that the idea of
giving herself to her husband without all
We must be careful
that what we do for
God does not
become more
important than our
relationship with
Him.
the
extras
made
her
uncomfortable.
Allowing
him to love her, just as she was, was
scary. After all, what if she gave
him her heart and he rejected
it? It was much safer to offer
things like candles and perfect
makeup and fabulous meals.
Because let’s be honest: it
doesn’t hurt to have the
candles or dinner rejected like it does to
have your heart discarded.
I share in this woman’s struggle. Love is risk.
It is vulnerability and emotional nakedness.
And like the wife, I’d much rather extend
nice deeds than my heart. It feels safer.
Think about it: giving my hurting friend a
book about trust is easier than inviting her
to share her heart and dealing with the
personal
inadequacies
such
a
conversation might raise. Sending a card
of encouragement to a grieving friend is
safer than sitting face to face and
experiencing heart-wrenching loss with her.
So, love gets a little regimented; another
thing to check off the to-do list. And
ultimately, a great deal of impact is lost.
In the next issue, we will open a
conversation about how to practically
engage our hearts, not just our limbs, in
loving others. For now, I want to address
the spiritual aspect behind this issue.
Turns out, we face the temptation to bring
lists to our romance with Jesus, too. We find
it easiest to identify our love for God by
what we accomplish for Him. Again, I have
never written, “love God today” on my todo list. But I have been known to strategize
things like this in my heart:
-spend a year in Voluntary Service
with a Mennonite mission
-spend an hour reading
the Bible every morning
-volunteer at the church’s
kids’ ministry every week
-sacrifice financially to support an
overseas missionary
-lead the ladies’ Bible study
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