Wednesday, January 5, 2002                                     (today’s lectionary)
Memorial of Saint John Neumann, Bishop
Love on central standard time
There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love.
Driving through Texas and Arkansas, I was quiet in the car. That is to say, quiet along with Harry Potter, Abraham Lincoln, and a farmer writing about farming in England. I was too quiet with Jesus. We didn’t talk much. And that’s not the way I want things to be between us.
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God.
That’s the problem, or so we used to say. Why don’t you talk to us, Lord? You don’t want us to see you, is that it? God’s patience must be unbounded, when he hears questions like that repeated over and over.
I resist taking responsibility in our relationship. If Margaret doesn’t call me, then I call her, and vice versa. Neither of us expect the other person to be “in charge.” We are both in charge. How do I apply this to my friendship with God?  John has more to tell me about that:
If we love one another, God remains in us and his love is brought to perfection in us.
Trying to understand my relationship with God, I remember that it takes time and effort to sustain a friendship, or a marriage, or real intimacy with daughter or son. In other words, it takes time and effort to love one another, time spent together, and effort made both to talk and to listen. When we do this, God remains in us.
What are Gary Chapman’s five “love languages?”
- Words of affirmation
- Quality time
- Physical touch
- Acts of service
- Receiving gifts
Call this list the 5 T’s: talk, time, touch, tasks, treasures.
If these are five primary ways to love you, then these might also be five primary ways to love God, love Jesus, love the Holy Spirit. Makes sense to me.
So, just as is true for Margaret and I, Jesus and I share talk, share time, find ways to “touch” each other, DO for each other, and offer each other gifts. In the face of these efforts, our “otherness” decreases and our com-unity increases.
God is love and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him. In this is love brought to perfection among us, that we have confidence on the day of judgment because as he is, so are we in this world.
I have often sung the beautiful song, “This World Is Not My Home.” I love to play it on my guitar. But Jesus made “this world” his home, God made it his home. Perhaps I should rethink and not be in such a hurry to get away. There is no fear in love.
He shall rescue the poor when he cries out, and the afflicted when he has no one to help him. Lord, every nation on earth will adore you.
Evidence of fulfillment of these promises generally arrives when the need arises. It also seems to come when I arise to meet someone else’s need, and love arises, pours out, pressed down and shaken together, running over, as my Nebraska buddy reminded me recently.
After the five thousand had eaten and were satisfied, Jesus’ disciples got into their boat and Jesus went off to the mountain, to pray.
I received acts of service and gifts, eating breakfast yesterday at the Days Inn in Blytheville, Arkansas. Of course no loaves and fishes, I thought maybe I could get a dry danish and coffee. But eggs, sausage, biscuits and gravy, orange juice, good coffee and pancakes? Who expects a $50 motel to have breakfast like that on a Tuesday morning? I felt loved at 6 am. I was loved at 6:15. Shaken together and running over.
(1 John 4, Psalm 72, 1 Timothy 3, Mark 6)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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