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If God is Love, and Jesus is God, then Jesus was Love made incarnate.  It’s been a while since I had Philosophy 102 (Logic), but I’m pretty sure that was how it worked.  If A is B, and C is A, then C is B.

 

Do we lose sight of this?  Do we lose the perspective that it is Love which is the fundamental language of this world?  Not power.  Not self-importance.  That we were made for Love.  And if we are called to be an image of Christ in the world, an image of God’s Love made incarnate, then isn’t it that our lives are supposed to come to be a reflection of love itself.  Shouldn’t our christian discipline be bringing us more into alignment with that?  Shouldn’t my prayer, fasting, study, service all gradually craft me further into that image of Love in the midst of the world?  

What would that look like?  If we were truly a reflection of Love itself.

 

“Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated,  it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

 

Does that passage describe you?  Does it describe me.  Shouldn’t it?  If we are followers of Love made flesh, images of the Father’s love and mercy, shouldn’t this be who we are?

 

If I went home to your family, your friends, your coworkers, the people who know you best… and asked them, Is he patient?  Is he kind?  Is he ‘not pompous’?.  Does he seek his own interests?  Does he brood over injury? Does he rejoice with the truth?  What would they say?  What would your wife say?

 

Oh, if only it were true.  What a father I would be.  What a husband.  What a witness of Christ in the midst of this hostile world.  Is there anything more counter-culture, then, to be an image of selfless love in the midst of a world hell-bent on self-absorption.  And, our home, which we would crave to be that place of joy and hope and wonder.  But, instead it is too often filled with criticism, complacency and self-seeking.  Which am I leading them to?  Where am I leading my children?  In the way of self importance.  Or in the way of love.

 

So this is why I fast.  This is why I pray.  This is why I try to break my addiction to self-absorption and selfishness.  This is why I try to go ever deeper in my surrender to the God of love.  I do not do it because its what I’m supposed to do (though it is).  Or because I'm trying to prove my religiosity.  It’s not even just because it is the deepest longing of my soul, the genuine response of a childlike soul to the love of the Father.   I do it to grow closer to Him, that my heart might be filled with His love, for them to encounter.  That I might decrease and He might increase. That I might finally start to resemble my lord, Jesus Christ… love made flesh.  So that my children might encounter the love that changed my life… through me.

And the constant barometer for how I’m doing in my Christian journey is in how my family would answer those questions.  Is he patient?  Is he kind?  Does he brood over injury?  Is he self-seeking?  Still, after 20 years of practice, you'd think I'd be much better at it.

 

Father, I give myself anew today.  I am yours.  Craft me into an image of your love.  In this midst of this world, full of resentments, wounds and fatherlessness, make me an image of your fatherly love, a light in the dark.  Ever patient.  Ever kind.  Ever loving.  Ever forgiving.  Ever your adoring child.

T. R Olsen
East Peoria, IL