The macadamia and I saw "He's Just Not That Into You" the other night. Of course, being girls, we don't really need a reason to start talking about relationships and people, but the movie definitely spurred some conversation. What does a healthy relationship look like? Which of the relationships portrayed in the film most closely resembled that? How much of a difference is there between relationships with a Christian foundation and relationships without one? (Somewhere in there, I pointed out that there is a significant portion of the female population that NEVER gets marred. She didn't believe me, but we looked it up - 24%. That's almost 1 in 4. Given the number of weddings I've been associated with, well . . . I won't say it here, she'll hit me again.)
And then my brother called me a couple of nights ago and we started talking about the same sort of thing - only with a broader scope. The tone of the conversation was different simply because neither of us is in a relationship right now and we can ask questions like "is it really beneficial to get paired up with another person?" Sure, the desire's there for a reason, but if you're honest with yourself, are you going to live a life of fuller productivity for God with the distraction of another person? That, of course, raises the question of which is the greater distraction: desiring a relationship, or being in one. I'm not sure we reached much of a solid conclusion with that, beyond "Some relationships are really good and definitely founded on mutual pursuit of God...others, not so much. Right now, God has both of us in a place of 'being single' so we'll just go with that." It was a good conversation.
All of the talking got me pondering. And then I read 1 John before I left for work tonight.
"By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth." ~ 1 John 3:16-18, NKJV
I could keep typing up verses from that book - there are so many that go *ZOT!* - but I'm pretty sure that all of the random brain things that I'm typing up already are going to get confusing, so I'm going to try to slow down my thoughts to match my typing speed and make the statement that I almost used as the title to this post: love sucks.
Regardless of the context - romantic, friendship, parent-child, passing acquaintanceship - love, real love, sucks. It hurts. It's sacrifice. There are definitely a bundle of benefits to go with it - and the warm fuzzies of knowing someone else cares are pretty cool - but when you get down to the nitty gritty of just what it is that God's telling us to do.....yeah, it bites.
Think about it: when Christ was on His way to the cross, that was love. That was why He came. We're called to pick up our cross and follow Him (Matt. 16:24). Our love for Him brings the likelihood of persecution and lack of understanding on the part of others (John 15:20). Putting some serious thought into the whole "marriage is a reflection of Christ's relationship with the church" thing will absolutely blow your mind. Christ died for the church. The church is martyred for Christ. Christians don't take part in certain lifestyles because we believe they are not honoring to God. It's a form of sacrifice not unlike the sacrifices that are made in solid marriage relationships every day.
*sigh* Ok, my train of thought totally got interrupted by various dealings here at work. The general point that I'm trying to make is that love is hard. But I guess that makes sense...I mean, it's a - if not THE - key aspect of God. Without Him, it's pretty much impossible.
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