My Valentine

Then he said to them, "My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me." 
And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will." 

Matthew 26:38-39

     These words may just be the most perfect living definition of love that I have ever heard. This is love lived out in sweat and blood; love summed up in the sweet agony of utter selflessness; a real and an active love that is not content with flippancy or empty words. This is the ultimate Valentine.

     Every year when Valentine's Day is on the horizon, I find myself mulling over the word, "love." My tendency is to think first of the choice and not the feelings, for while the feeling of love is nice, it is the choice to love that weathers the storms and that brings abiding joy. It is rather tragic that we live in a culture where the feeling of love, the "being in love" part is exalted. That part is a trinket, a fancy, a season that will wax and wane and has no real substance or staying power. The feeling of love can be easily affected by how we slept last night or by what we ate. Why, then, do we prize this feeling so highly? We are like small children: so captivated by the shiny wrapping paper that we miss the value of the true gift inside.

     I am glad that Christ did not value emotion over choice in this instance. If He did, He likely would have given up here, at this moment on His knees and struggling against His own emotion. His emotion said, "Father, please don't make me go through this. Don't make me do it," but His will said, "I submit to Your higher purpose." Jesus acted, not on his feelings, but on the commitment and the long-lasting choice to love.

     This choice, too, is something that deserves a closer look. Ultimately, when I look at this passage, the temptation is to think, "Ah, He loved me so that He was willing to go through all this torture and shame for my sake." However, as I have walked more and more with Him, I am not so sure about that initial assumption.

     I believe that what we see here is not His incredible love for us, but His incredible love for the Father.

     Let me take a moment to dig into this. First, we must remember that in some inexplicable way, Jesus was fully God and fully man. This is a paradox, an impossibility in our eyes, but it does not reflect something unrealistic. It merely reflects our own finite inability to wrap our created, organic minds around infinite, spiritual truths. It is our perception of what is and is not real that is distorted here, and distorted because we are dimensional beings trying to fathom something that goes beyond the realm of our limited, physical experience. We must leave the hows and whys and simply understand that it is because it is and move on.

     Secondly, we must understand that what drove Jesus to His knees on this fateful night was not an overwhelming feeling of affection and tenderness for those men who would soon be mocking Him and inflicting incredible pain, nor was it affection for those who would later come and mock His death by proclaiming His name while living disobediently to His commands. No, it was a desire to find some other way, a hope that maybe God would provide another method by which His will would be done.

     Why, then, did He choose to go through with it? The answer is in the last line of His brief but potent prayer, "Nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will." His love for the Father was so great that He was willing to subjugate His own will--the strong desire to avoid suffering and death--to the will of the Father. It was not feelings of tenderness, but the blunt force of commitment driven by the choice to value the Father's will above His own that brought my Jesus to the cross. He loved us then and loves us now, yes. That is true. And it is and was a love of choice, not of fickle feelings. But when the moment of truth came, it was the true love; the love that prizes the beloved above all that is within the self, that compelled Him to surrender to the cross: It was nothing less than His devotion to the Father that brought Him through the that miserable time of temptation. It was the putting first of God's will above His own that instigated the one, perfect act of love the world has ever seen. He showed His love to us by first loving the Father above all else, even above Himself. We are the beneficiaries, the unworthy recipients of that astonishing love.

     And here is where I hang my hat: on the love of the Father. I postulate to you today that if you love the Father's will above your own, you will find that true, abiding, and lasting love for others welling up from somewhere inside you. If you love Him first and foremost, love for others will be the natural outpouring of that love. It may be true that your marriage stinks, your husband or wife has treated you horribly, you are miserable and unhappy. However, do not miss that Jesus was miserable and unhappy in the Garden that night, but that did not change the driving force of His commitment. His love remained through the temptation, and His love brought Him through it.

     You may not be able to muster feelings of love for your spouse, your parents, your children, your co-workers right now. That is fine. I am not asking you to. Fix your mind and will steadily on the Father right now. Find your first love in Him. Love Him and His ways above all else and be willing to sacrifice everything to do His will. Do not let your marriage go because of feelings: commit to it because of love for God. Do not give up on your children because of your emotion; commit to them because of your love for God.

     A word to those whose marriages are crumbling on this Valentine's day: Don't give up. That is the world's way, the way of the Father of Lies. You will not find happiness and contentment elsewhere if you cannot find it here, because happiness and contentment come, not from your spouse, but from your love for God. Above all else, love God, for He is love and the only source of genuine love. Love Him and His kingdom first, and all the rest will be added to you. Do not stay married out of stubbornness or because you hope you will fall in love with your spouse again. Stay married because you love God; because you know that He hates divorce and you love Him too much to do something He hates. Do it because you truly love Him more than you love yourself.

     You do not have to feel this--choose it. Do it despite your feelings. Christians, if we would lay down our lives for Him as He did for us, if we would lay down our lives for our spouses and families out of love for our great and glorious God, we would find that the choice to love is far finer and more rare a thing than the feelings of being "in love." We will find something purer, deeper, more wonderful than we have yet imagined. We will find true love, lasting love. We will find joy.

As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. John 15:9-13

     Happy Valentine's Day!