FAMILY MATTERS
FAMILY MATTERS
December 2011
THE TWELVE C’S OF LOVE:
1 Corinthians 13 and More…
C IS FOR CELEBRATION
Introduction
There is nothing in all of life more important to us than the relationships that we cherish and that sustain and encourage us in our life’s journey. Nothing can displace them. In fact, what an empty and meaningless journey it would have been without them. When all else is said and done, our final days will be spent in relishing and celebrating these choice relationships. They are far more valuable than any amount of silver and gold.
Since we are made for love, we are always surprised by how these relationships impact us and how we are also impacted by those who, for whatever reason, chose not to love us. People love us because they are loving and know how to give of themselves. Those who do not love us are not capable of loving, yet how often we believe it is because we are not worth loving. Any who deem us not worth loving know nothing of God’s unconditional love of us. They may have their reasons and be able to articulate them, or they may not. But at the root of their inability is a lack of self-love. We celebrate our worth in Him but we still have to deal with the pain of not being loved by another. And when that lack of love is with a significant person in our lives, that adds to the struggle we have to deal with. The younger we are the greater this impacts us.
Our greatest celebrations focus around these meaningful relationships we have learned to cherish and maintain. Those that are with significant others in our early life shape us the greatest and remain our major source of celebration. Moving from the known to the unknown, from parents to God, as a child, is greatly influenced by those parental images, and for many of us God got a raw deal. We saw Him through our parental experiences. This left little to celebrate and a whole lot to fear. But as we matured, God took on a new image for us in the Face of Jesus, His Son.
One of the characteristics of love is joy, and joy is the basis of celebration. Love always finds sources of joy and each is celebrated fully and wisely. Love wants the best; love seeks the best; love rejoices in the best taking shape and fulfilling itself. This is the hilarious, meaningful aspect of love that knows how to celebrate to the fullest. We see this in the Apostle Paul when he has almost lost his life on the part of new churches and then sees the result in changed lives and transformed souls. Love forgets the pain and suffering endured and glories in the results.
Love rejoices in the truth. We live in a culture of duplicity, spin and deception, as well as self-deception, and when the truth emerges and can be seen for what it is, the heart rejoices. The truth is out; now it is discerned and celebrated. At long last it is revealed and it is obvious to us God is in it. Now we know what to do; what to become. Love has triumphed once again and love is eternal.
Love rejoices in its own being and doing. No matter how long truth may be waited for, love believes it will be present and known. It rejoices in hope, and rejoices again when it is fulfilled. It knew within itself that the fulfillment would come, because love is of God. It was willing to hang in there and await its consummation, for the Promise is present, and love will never come up empty for it is of God.
It brings joy within itself and celebrates life. Life is God’s gift to us; how we live it is our gift to Him. Life is His God-gift bought for us at the price of His Cross, and we are going to surrender to it and allow it to be lived out in and through us. We can celebrate the results of this transforming transaction for it is all of God. This is why He gave us life and this is how it is to be lived out as unto Him. This is the reason for love’s very existence.
Love knows how and why to celebrate. It is going to spend all eternity doing just that. With all praise to the Father, to Christ the Son, and to the Spirit of Holiness, our forever-celebration will know no ending, and for its beginning, it was fanned to a blaze at the Cross and Empty Tomb.
Our marriages and families recall celebrations as milestones along the way. Every couple has their own occasions to celebrate in addition to holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, and times cherished only by them. The same is true of families as well. When a special memory is recounted, all chime in and add their observation and feeling to complete the whole. These measure the joy that flows through their history together. These are the highlights that mark their way.
1. Love celebrates life…its high points and bumps
We are here because God wants us here and however we got here is not the question, but why we are here is. We are in God’s planning and we are here on purpose, a divine purpose. Now we seize it and celebrate it. The high points affirm us; the bumps mature us. We honor Him for it all.
2. Love celebrates forgiveness and reconciliation…and its struggles with alienation
Love celebrates His forgiveness and how He has reconciled us to Himself. But at the same time we see His working in and through our struggles with alienation, bringing us back to Himself and to harmony with others. We honor Him for it all.
3. Love celebrates loving…and being loved…along with every time of loving
Love celebrates every aspect of loving and being loved, and wherever it is found and shared. God is omnipresent when love is present; God is omnipotent when love is active; God is omniscient when He is allowed to be in control. Love isn’t God but God is love.
4. Love celebrates growth, development and maturing…and
the transforming accompanies each experiencing of it
Love creates growth; it brings development and maturing; it creates transformation wherever it is present, active, and affirmed. Love forges out the Kingdom of God in hearts, homes, and wherever two or three gather in His Name.
5. Love celebrates meaning and purpose…and cannot go without it
It brings meaning to all who experience and share it; it gives them purpose and a genuine sense of worth; they know life is meaningless without it being present. No matter what life holds for them, love is what makes it all worthwhile and purposeful.
6. Love celebrates all it receives and shares from His Spirit…it is all of God
Love knows it owes God its very existence, and everything it has is received from Him. Its very breath is a gift from Him. It is ours only through the Gift of His Holy Spirit abiding in us. For this reason it owes Him its all. I cannot celebrate His Gift enough.
7. Love is in love with God and God-life…and cannot live without it
It learns to love God with all of its being and to seek to live life as He ordains. Living as unto Him is the summum bonum of its existence. God-life is the highest form of life possible. Its only life is in Him and that is where it delights to be. Christ is its very life and pleasure.
8. Love lives to the glory of God alone…and thrills when He is thrilled
To be able to thrill the heart of God is its deepest pleasure and joy. This is its reason for being. It gives its utmost to achieve this pleasure. It has no other reason for living and loving. It thrills to the experience of counting for Him.
9. Love rejoices in the truth…and this truth is what sets it free
To us truth is found in Jesus Christ, and all of the issues of life are judged in terms of who He is and what He has done on our behalf. To us, truth is the quality of a proposition as it corresponds to the very nature of God. To rejoice in the truth is to rejoice in God, and Truth is who He is. That is the truth that truly sets us free to believe fully in Him.
10. Love will celebrate all eternity…and will go right on loving fully, freely, eternally
When Paul wrote “the greatest is love,” it is because of the greatness of God and the great gift of redemption He has shared with us in His Son. As we praise Him every day for what He has done for us in Christ, so eternity will echo the same. We will never have said “Thank You” enough.
Conclusion
Look at all love has to celebrate…beginning with the Cross, Empty Tomb and the full Christ Event. Now add to this all He has blessed us with because we are His and have our life in Him. Then add marriage and family life, friends and extended family, and all we have in the Community of Faith. Think of the love the Spirit has immersed us in!
Love makes a difference…and where would we be today if that had been missing in our lives? As every Child of God knows, we have been and are blessed.
Love is eternal…and so are we. Can you imagine an eternity where love is supreme and it leaves no room for anything else but more love? We will know nothing but love. Sure sounds like Heaven to me!
God is love…and in His Kingdom of Love, it overmasters all else. Love finds real answers to all life’s questions because then we will know as we are known. We will see Jesus as he really is as mirrored in 1 John 4. The only mystery left to consider is why He chose to love us as He does.
Love isn’t God but God is love…and in the reality of that truth comes the destiny He has chosen for us in Himself. Paul said he wanted to be apprehended by that for which God apprehended him in the beginning and that means being apprehended by and for His love.
But all this also leaves us with a great challenge here and now. “Thus, if there is no conceivable human behavior that as such could be unambiguously referred to as ‘love,’ if ‘love’ is beyond all separation in which people live, and if everything that people can understand and practice as love is conceivably only human behavior within given separations, then there is still a puzzle here, an open question as to what the Bible could mean by ‘love.’ And the Bible does not fail to give us an answer. It’s also well enough known to us, but it’s just that again and again we misinterpret it. The answer is: ‘God is love’ (1 John 4:16). For the sake of clarity, this sentence must first be read with the emphasis on the word ‘God,’ whereas we have been used to emphasizing the word ‘love.’ God is love. This means that not a human behavior, not an attitude, not a deed, but God Himself is love. Only those who know God know what love is, not the other way around. That is, it’s not that we first – and from nature – know what love is, and then on that basis also know what God is. Rather, no one knows God, unless God has revealed Himself to them (1 John 4:7-9). … Love has its origin not in us but in God. Love is not human behavior but the behavior of God (1 John 4:10).” [July 20, page 211. I WANT TO LIVE THESE DAYS WITH YOU: A Year of Daily Devotions. Translated by O. C. Dean, Jr. Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville/London; 2007.]
I’m glad we could make this journey together here and now and also in eternity as His own. It is a journey in love, for love, to love, and into a first-hand encounter with the One who is Love. There are more than twelve C’s to be considered, but this has been a good beginning. Now the challenge is to live it out until He calls us Home. Can you imagine what awaits on that Day?
Together we love Him, but remember, He first loved us and gave Himself for us.
Dr Emil J. Authelet
eauthelet@cox.net
