The Limits of Love (2)

Loving Within Limits

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the
courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

This well-known prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr provides some guidance for those who
want to know how to love within the limits imposed upon us by time, space, the
past, the present, ignorance, differences between the sexes, different love
languages, and other frustrating factors.

Some things cannot – or should not -be changed. These include our marital
status. The Bible teaches that God hates divorce, for example.(Malachi 2:16)

So, if I am a Jew or Christian who takes the Scriptures seriously and who is unhappy
with my marriage, I have not liberty to leave one partner and marry another.
Nor may I “cleave” (cling) to anyone other than the one whom I promised to
love until death parted us.

Age, gender, past experiences, and the natural boundaries of time and space
stand before us as immovable barriers to some expressions of our love for
someone of the other sex.

These we must simply accept as from God. The New Testament teaches that “all
things work together for good for those who love God, to those who are the
called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). A Christian may, therefore,
be “giving thanks always for all things,” because all things – no matter how
frustrating or painful –  are gifts from God to his people, meant somehow to
advance their growth into greater moral conformity to their Creator
(Ephesians 5:20; 1:4; 5:1-2)

Of course, non-believers are at liberty to complain about their lot and do
all they can to break out of the prisons in which they think they are
unfairly bound, but millennia of history, not to mention virtually every
love story, should have amply demonstrated by now that self-centered, moral
law-defying actions are like powerful waves that crash and dissipate into
mist the moment they encounter the rocks of the fundamental ethical
principles of the universe. Nothing but misery results.

On the other hand, if we actually thank God for the boundaries which he has
set all around us, and submit willingly to them, we may find them to be like
tracks on which a high-speed train can race smoothly to its appointed
destination – greater and greater resemblance to the self-sacrificing,
ever-giving love of Christ and of God.

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally
and without reproach, and it will be given to him” (James 1:5). When
confined by circumstances which cannot be altered, then we may beg God to
guide us into his will. Perplexed about how rightly to love another, or
how to show that love, we may confidently petition the Author of love, the
one who created us as male and female, to lead us into the way of love.

God gives wisdom, but only to those who listen daily to his voice as
revealed in the Scriptures, and who humbly ask the advice of others who can
provide godly and wise counsel. (Proverbs 2:1-22; 3:3-6; 4:1-27; 8:6-9,
32-36) Pagan or worldly suggestions should be rejected, however, for they
only direct us to the door that opens onto destruction and death. So, a
group of divorced friends, or those living in adultery, or those whose
values come from the narcissistic culture of television, movies, and romance
novels, will not be of much use to someone sincerely desiring to do what is
right.

In short, confronted with unchangeable realities, we must, first, accept
this fact; then, give thanks for it; and finally, ask for wisdom from God.
In all this, we will experience God afresh, and come to appreciate what the
Son of God did when he chose to pour his immense deity into the body of a
little baby in first-century, Roman-occupied Palestine. Certainly, the man
Jesus had to live, and love, within the tight restrictions of time, place,
social situation, gender, marital status, net financial worth, and a very
short life.

Can we imagine that Jesus did not look with male appreciation upon the women
who devoted their lives to him? Did the one who commanded men not to look
upon a woman with the intention to lust after her (Matthew 5:28) not have
known the attractive power of feminine beauty? We are told outright that he “loved”
Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus. (John 11:5) Just as clearly, Mary
– especially Mary – loved Jesus with all her being, and did not hesitate to
express her love as tangibly as she could (see John 12:1-3).

Must we suppose that Jesus, as a normal male, never wanted to give Mary a holy hug, or even a
chaste kiss on the cheek? Perhaps reverent orthodoxy demands such a supposition, but I
find it both unlikely and unnecessary.  I may be wrong, but I think that his
full humanity included natural human affection, while his spotless character
saved him from the least taint of illicit desire or inappropriate behavior.

In other words, we must not think that we alone must live, and love, within
the limits of God’s law and the unalterable “rocks” that stand in the way of
unrestrained displays of affection for the other sex.

(To be continued