One of the things I find tiring is sorting through the re-defining of words. I’m talking about perfectly good words that have a solid history and setting in which they have normally been used. On the one hand, it can be annoying, on the other it can be insidious. This is especially true when words that express the great truths of the faith are co-opted and redefined surreptitiously and quietly. Take a word like “Resurrection” when referring to the resurrection of our Lord. For close to two millennia we knew what that meant –the physical bodily resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ three days after his brutal death on a Roman cross.
I was in my teens when I discovered that the word “Resurrection” had altered by some to not really mean that kind of literal resurrection, But a type of resurrection. The disciples (so this redefinition goes) experienced the coming-to-life again of the idea of Jesus and his teaching and through that experience they “saw” the Lord. Bollocks to that.
As St. Paul put it, “For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Than those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” (1 Cor 15:16-19)
So there are Christians (speaking loosely) that will say they believe in the “resurrection” but hold no such actual belief in what the Scriptures teach and the Church has universally taught since the 1st Century. Words matter. So do their definitions.
Today “Love” is one of these redefined words. For many people today “Love” is something received, something one seeks for themselves. It is the experience of being loved that is sought and people look for it in a myriad of ways –through social media popularity, or sexual encounters, or in success in a field of work. I’d suggest that in the modern world, most people do not know what real love is. They long for it, yes. But what they often fill their lives with is pyrite love– fools gold love. Lust is not love. Popularity is not love. Success is not love. It’s like drinking a Big K Cola instead of a Coke. There are some similarities but there’s nothing quite like the real thing
In today’s society, even among Christians, we are missing out on authentic love because we’re focused on getting love instead of giving, sharing love, living love. This was the focus of Jesus’ instructions to us. In the Bible, the headwaters of Love is God himself. He is the one who defines it, scatters it over his creation, and in Him love finds its true meaning. His love is expressed chiefly in the Incarnation, sacrificial death, and resurrection of Jesus. It is, through and through, a giving love. A crazy-generous love that even extends to those who are his enemies. It is His love, lived out in His community that he said would prove the validity of that community- the Church.
Jesus said, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
I think many Christians (myself included) must relearn the true meaning of the word “Love” It is this Jesus-imitating love that will proclaim to the world the Gospel of Jesus. Sadly today we ration our love as If it were scarce resource to be spent on a few people that I already like, that agree with me, that will love me too, and will not challenge me. But this isn’t love. That is just mutual back-scratching flattery..
What if we took the scriptures seriously? What if we dared to love with the extravagance of love the Bible demonstrates? What if, by the poewer of the Holy Spirit we began to love our neighbors as our selves? What if we embraced the call to lead in love– that real, authentic, life-giving, truth-telling love that really sought the blessing of God on those we love?
I think that maybe, just maybe, it would change the world.
Just like it did the first time.