What a crazy year 2015 has been! Just as we embark on wholistic missions – preaching the gospel of salvation and rebuilding houses for disaster survivors, the world starts to spin out of control (MERS outbreak, terrorism, mass migrations, departure of beloved leaders, earthquakes, etc.) making us all feel a little winded. From one disaster to another, the people in South Asia are rocked by natural and man-made calamities one after another. Our missionary there sheds some light in his report.
Even as we try to grapple with the mess in and around us, doing God’s work is becoming increasingly tough and tiring. Gone are the days when ministry could go on relatively unhindered by political & economic upheavals. Preaching the Good News in word and work today is equally vulnerable to skyrocketing costs along with everything else. When our pastors can’t commute for lack of petrol and public transport options, how do they serve their community? Do we continue with rebuilding when material prices have doubled? When things go awry or even regress like this after many years toiling in faith, we can’t help but look around and wonder if the world is worth loving and serving afterall.
Jose L. Navajo, author of Mondays with My Old Pastor, writes that there are2 types of love. One is love because. And another is love inspite. He explains that Love because is conditional.
I love you because I find complete satisfaction in you. Because you fulfill all my expectations, because with you I am totally happy…Because you are appreciative, caring, considerate, compassionate, etc.
Nothing wrong in this. It is always better to love because than not to love at all. But there is a downside to this. It doesn’t give of itself wholeheartedly and it has an inevitable expiry date. The day these reasons start to wane or disappear, you’ll find loving in the absence of these qualities, incredibly difficult.
There is a higher option that is worthy and ever-lasting: it’s love inspite. I love you even though you can’t always fulfill my expectations, are appreciative, even though you are not present with me. This is 1 Corinthians 13. This kind of love does not expire and can support the weight of any relationship. This is the kind of love God declares towards us in Rom 5:8 – “But God demonstrate His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
There are people who say, “We don’t love each other anymore” or “our love has ended,” and they say it with all sincerity, suffering. In every case that I have observed, the kind of love that has worn out is the love because. No one is capable to always fulfilling their loved one’s expectations. A time will come when we fail, when we are not at our best at loving fully. At some point we will offend them or let them down. The love because becomes resentful at these times, but the love although covers these valleys with bridges of forgiveness and fills the potholes with understanding.
Similarly, when our situation fails or becomes increasingly bleak for a prolonged period, will our love wear out and become resentful?
So we return and look to our Source. God loves inspite of. His unconditional love doesn’t depend on us or the situation – how good we are or how conducive the environment is. We take courage and inspiration from Him and aspire to love and serve inspite of. It’s the only work that is real, true and that will last. And yes, we have resumed financial support for some of our pastors and disaster rebuilding work for affected families continues!
For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike.
Matthew 5:45
