We will be convening here at the ZigZag café, Suisse, on Thursdays for conversation and dialogue. I invite you to stop by every Thursday for the question of the day. Your thoughts and participation are most welcome. Pull up a stool, avec un café, un thé, ou un chocolat chaud, et un croissant, and join in here on Thursday at the ZZ café.
For today:
Does being loved carry with it any legitimate expectations as to how this love must be given and expressed?
4 comments:
Greg,
I hope you're doing well. I would argue that the concept of love cannot mean anything and everything, nor can it be expressed in any way we desire. Two aspects of Scripture, in particular, guide us towards a true understanding of love and what legitimate expressions of it look like. First would be the creation narratives, which, for example, provide rational for treating other human beings lovingly because they bear the image of God. Just briefly, an implication of this truth would be that loving others requires us to treat them with dignity, as fellow image-bearers; not presuming that we have an inherent authority over others as Cain did when he took Abel's life. Second, authentic love has been expressed first and foremost through God's own actions in history, culminating in the sending of his Son. These last several weeks at the beginning of our children's Sunday School class the teacher has asked the question, "How do we know what God is like?" to which the kids respond "He shows me what he's like." Our patterns of loving should be rooted in the canonical practices we find within the biblical text itself.
Rhett
Rhett,
Thanks. I hope you're well too.
These thoughts are helpful and I see you have given this matter some attention. Good! We probably don't do enough of that.
To take a different angle: In a deep friendship, it seems to me there ought to be effort to at least meet in the middle somewhere. For example, I *feel* most loved via verbal affirmation and physical affection, but I still *know* I'm loved via other means, even when my wired-in needs for words and touch aren't met. When my wired-in needs aren't met at all, it sucks to have to continually remind myself intellectually I'm loved, which is why I think it's probably better to give and take.
Renea,
Thanks. I like the different angle. Just what expectations are valid in 'being loved'? Wired-in needs of words and touch, which are not met, may say more about the demands and desires of the loved, than the lover. Finding some kind of 'meeting place' would be essential.
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