The Geometry of Love

What is the shape of Christ’s love?
What are its dimensions?

“And I pray that you , being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ…” (Ephesians 3:17-18, NIV)

The love of Christ is wide. 
It is expansive and far-reaching. It is broad and encompassing. It goes out of bounds. Like the horizon, where earth meets sky, it is endless in both directions.

The love of Christ is long.
It infinitely unravels from an eternal spool. It has been forever before me and will be after me forever. It does not expire. It does not run out. It endures.

The love of Christ is high.
It is upward. It is ascending. It is the penthouse suite and the elevator that takes me there. It is a wall my heart can scale for eternity and never reach the top.

The love of Christ is deep.
It is penetrating. It plunges to the pit of me.  It is intrepid.  It goes where no other love dares to go. There is no part of me that is too far, too hidden, or too dark.

The love of Christ is wide enough to reach everyone, long enough to last forever, high enough to lift our spirits, and deep enough to reach the most buried parts of our souls. May we grasp the dimensions of the love of Christ.

One Big Question the Bible Doesn’t Answer

I have a list of things I want to ask God when I meet Him face to face. (For starters, why mosquitoes?!)

There is one big question that the Bible doesn’t seem to answer, and it is this: Why did God create humans in the first place??

Some suggest that God created humans for His glory.
Some suggest that God created humans because He is love, and love needs an object of itself.

I have problems with both of those starting points.
The “glory-seeking God” approach often turns into the “glory-hungry God” approach. As a result, events contrary to the will of God are explained as bringing glory to God. It’s tragic and atrocious, really.
The “God needs give love” approach often boils down to a God who would somehow be incomplete without humans.  May or may not be true…but I’m suspicious about that.

So here’s my take…

I think God created humans simply because He is creative. Stick with me here…

If you have ever known an artist (I mean a real, practicing artist–not just some emo, hipster who carries around a Moleskine to impress people), then you know that artists have this impulse to create something. Out of the overflow of who they are, they write music, paint pictures, design ads, pen poems, sketch the world around them….they create things just because they’re creative!

I remember being in a coffee shop in the college town where I attended grad school on the day the shop was hosting an art exhibit. Some of the work I saw was absolutely stunning. Just magnificent craftsmanship and talent!  And as a result, a sort of respect welled up within me for the artist. Something like glory. On some occasions, I have had the opportunity to talk with artists of various sorts and express my appreciation for their work. Sometimes they say things like, “Thanks. This piece is really special to me because…”  Something like love.

I’m beginning to think the answer to this big question posed at the outset is something like the relationship between artist and art. Let me say it plain.  God created humans because He’s creative.  And as a result of His magnificent work, He receives glory.  And He loves His art because it’s special to Him for whatever reason. Is that so far-fetched?

So, in sum, I think the ideas that God created humans for His glory or for His love have the whole thing reversed. God created humans because He’s creative. And as a result, He loves them and receives glory from them and through them. What do you think?  How would YOU answer the big question?

Why Would a Loving God Send People to Hell?

It’s simple, really.  Some people don’t want to be in Heaven.
The reality of Heaven is expansive!  There will be a new earth. There will be abundance, feasting, joy, music, fruitfulness, rest, wholeness, health, worship…
And at the center of it all is Jesus.

Soooooooo, if you don’t love Jesus, you won’t really dig Heaven.  And if you don’t dig Heaven, there’s an alternative for you.  What’s so hard to understand about that?

Now, as to the particulars of who and how and how many…well, I’ll leave Rob Bell and all his opponents to duke it out over that. Ha.

What if Love Ain’t Enough?

Man, that dude Peter Rollins really effs with my head. In a good way. He’s really on a whole other level.  This post isn’t about him though. Nor is it inspired by him. He just got me thinking. But anyway…

I wrote a song today. The hook simply says, “What if love ain’t enough?”

And every time I sing it out loud, I create this strange cognitive dissonance, because the question is really a statement…one that I don’t want to agree with.

I mean, on the one hand, God is love. So, love is everything and it IS enough!  But that’s not really what the song is about.  It’s really about how we use love as a concept to dodge doing the things that love calls us to do. It’s about how we allow sympathy, affection, and prayer requests to be sufficient even in the absence of justice, peace, mercy, meeting physical needs, acceptance, equality, and so forth. How slick of us!

If love is some religious veneer beneath which we carry on as if we do NOT love, well then love ain’t enough.

Sin is Helping Me

For some Christians, Christianity really gets in the way of them loving people like Jesus did. Sometimes I am that Christian. But I don’t really dig that. And God has been totally transforming me in this area. It’s happening in an odd way though.

Through my own sins, failures, and flaws, I am seeing that I am not that different from those “we” typically relegate to the outskirts of Christian community.

It becomes easier to love, respect, and accept people when you see yourself in them.

Identification

Jesus shared in our humanity.  That is what makes his ministry effective. He identifies with us.  He was like us.

What is it that makes loving and serving my neighbor so difficult?  Could it be that I do not sufficiently see myself in them?  I do not see that they are like me. I am like them. The identification that allows us to share in our humanity will empower me to minister effectively. And perhaps even lay down my life.

The Good Kind of Alone

I am alone.  I have been pondering my singleness much more lately.  And the words to articulate my experience are sort of clumsily emerging like a baby chicken hatching out of an egg. So here I go.

I am alone.

Yesterday evening, I was standing in the kitchen, washing dishes and listening to music. When my favorite parts would come on, I would sing at the top of my lungs.  And then hold rinsed glasses up to the light to make sure they were spotless. I cooked a nice dinner for myself, sat down at the table, and lit a candle. I ate alone.  And I was incredibly content. Peaceful. Restful. Satisfied. Content. This is not all that unusual for me, but my awareness of it, perhaps, is.  I had this startling sense of rightness. Like this is exactly how my life should be.

Over the last few months, I have been seriously contemplating whether or not the Lord is calling me to a lifetime of singleness.  There’s a lot to that…that I don’t feel like typing. But I wonder.  Sure, alone sometimes sucks. Like when I have way more grocery bags than I can haul on my own from my car to my apartment. Or when I need a dancing partner for Salsa Nights. Or when I don’t know what kind of new tires to put on my car (which, by the way, resulted in me putting expensive performance tires on my Toyota Matrix). But in general, this is a life I enjoy. This is the good kind of alone.

I have tried to manufacture a desire for marriage. It almost always feels artificial to me.  Much like non-wine-drinkers really truly trying to enjoy a nice red wine for which they simply have not acquired a taste.  I feel odd for not wanting what so many other women painfully long for.  Deep down, I wonder if I have simply extinguished the desire out of disillusionment.  But if singleness is not the life for me, I don’t know why I enjoy it so much.

So here I am…25…and alone.  Maybe for now. Maybe forever.  Peaceful. Restful. Satisfied. Content. The good kind of alone.

Comparing Pain

I think it is less painful to be alone than to be with someone who eventually rejects you.

I Met a Buddhist Monk

I was driving through town on my way to who-knows-where. I sat at a red light, daydreaming and waiting for my turn to go. And then I saw him. This boy standing on the corner diagonal from me. He looked about 15 years old. He was bald and barefoot and waving at everyone that passed by. But it wasn’t just waving. It was like the most exuberant waving I’ve ever seen. He nearly put his whole body into it! And he had this big goofy smile. My eyes were fixed on him. I was puzzled by his appearance and his behavior. The light turned green and I drove away.

A few days later, I went out to lunch with a friend on the Square. After lunch, we decided to stroll through the Square and find some place to get dessert. And there he was. Sitting outside my favorite coffee hangout. He sat alone at a sidewalk table with his legs folded in the chair, eating a sandwich. As we passed by, his face lit up and he waved at us and smiled. I whispered to my friend, "That’s him! That’s the dude I saw on the corner a few days ago! I can’t figure out what his deal is." We settled on a place for dessert and went inside. We were the only patrons there and picked a table by the window. We shared a tres leches cheesecake and while we were eating, he opened the door to the restaurant. He stuck his head and waved at the waitress. Then we watched him pass by our window. I was drawn to the mystery of him. The waitress asked us if we knew about him. Then she explained that he’s a Buddhist monk that goes to school here. Hmmm…

The next Wednesday, I was sitting in my Women’s Studies class and we were talking about motherhood. My professor dismissed us for a break and I wandered through the Philosophy building. And then I saw him! He was sitting in a room reading by himself. I was surprised and curious and felt compelled to say something, but he seemed to be a man of few words. What do you say to a Buddhist monk that you keep randomly seeing around town? So I opened the door to the room and said hello. He had his back to me. He turned around smiled and waved. And I stood halfway in the door smiling back. And then I left. I took a few steps down the hallway and realized I wanted to say more…I wanted him to say more. So I opened the door again and said, "I saw you last week by the coffee place!" He smiled and nodded. He put his hands over his heart and warmly said, "I love you." I didn’t really know what to say! "I love you too" didn’t seem right. So I froze and just smiled, and then I said, "Good to see you," and left.

He’s been on my mind, this Buddhist monk. I am perplexed. He has so much joy and warmth and love. He’s so friendly and free. I am blown away. I think I’m inspired. And then I wonder…

I have Jesus. But I do not have joy like that. I have Jesus. But I do not love freely like that. I have Jesus. But I do not delight in people like that. What does he have that I don’t have? How is it that I have within me the greatest gift of all but do not have joy and love like he has? Is the Buddhist monk putting me to shame? Do I not truly have what I thought I had? Or maybe I have it but the world has weighed down my heart?

He wears a loose tunic and pants and no shoes. He carries a case with an instrument in it wherever he goes. He is an enigma to me. I want to know. I want to know his story. I want to know his heart. When I see his heart, I see my own. And I realize how far away I am from the person I would like to be.