the curse of being in love

Love is a funny thing. There are so many facets to love, so many qualities to it that we could just never understand. I feel like God has been teaching me about how to love forever. I don't know if I'll ever truly get it. On the opposite end of the spectrum, fear is a funny thing, too. I mean, it's really not that funny...it's more obnoxious than anything. And yet, even being fully aware of this, how often do we allow fear to control our lives, to dictate our relationships, to decide how we feel and how we act, to keep us from being open, from being vulnerable, from taking risks?

"Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."
Proverbs 4:23

How much guarding have we been doing? How many walls have we put up around our hearts, our source of life, our one source of true connection with others, with God?

I get nervous about this, because I am continually learning about how important our hearts are, how much God cares about my heart, and how God is going to use my heart in His Kingdom; I get nervous because there is a difference between being careful with your heart, and being closed with your heart; I get nervous because I've put up so many walls to keep the bad out, which is important, but without even knowing it, these same protective walls have kept so much else out--so many potentially great things, so many people, and I think, sadly, that I've even locked God out of my heart on occasion.

And I think that if our guarding, our protective barriers, have the ability to keep things out, they also have the ability to turn on us, and destroy our ability to let our hearts do their jobs: to give life.

If we are so busy fearing and avoiding the unknown, the risky, the things that have the potential to hurt, we can't see that these same things, these scary things, are the same things that God would ask us to grab onto, and to run towards with our entire lives, with all of our hearts. God's greatest commandment to the world is simple, and terrifying: love. everyone.

Love is this incredible gift, this wonderfully beautiful ideal, that we are to share with everybody- friends, family, neighbors, spouses, even the people that we've barely just met. But I'm just going to be honest, it is scary. It is so vulnerable, and so naked. But it is so necessary. When we offer our hearts, hearts that have been redeemed and refined by Jesus, we offer life, and, I'm slowly learning, it's worth the risk. And when I say slowly, I really really mean it. I'm talking like a turtle's pace...

It's scary like the feeling when you move from having a crush on somebody to actually liking them and it moves from just being fun to being real; it's scary like when you actually start caring about a friend or a particular situation--your heart breaks when their heart breaks, you are burdened for them, you can no longer separate yourself from them...it's no longer just about you.

With all of this guarding, all of this closed-off-ness, it is so easy to confuse our fear with God's voice, or God's will. Where God would say, "Yes, open your heart to love and be loved," we interpret our fears and doubts as God saying, "No, not now, not yet..." or as God saying that we are no longer responsible for His greatest commandment, which, after writing it, just seems ridiculous.

Sometimes the risk is minimal, and that's awesome because it's not really that scary and it's really no biggie--maybe you just make a phone call or send a little text message. Sometimes the risk is far from minimal, and it's painful, and hard, and it's the best expression of love that we can muster up, and it gives life, and hope. But if nobody can see your heart, can feel your love, and experience the life that you have to give, then what is the point?

I'm going to steal a quote from "To Write Love on Her Arms:"

"Love is that simple answer to so many of our hardest questions. Don Miller says we're called to hold our hands against the wounds of a broken world, to stop the bleeding...Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter...I might be simple but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love. We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless...We won't solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way. We were made to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we're called home."

You know those people in your life that are just really really great at loving people, and you just don't really even understand? It just doesn't make sense because they seem so courageous and brave and still so whole, not broken, which is what I think we all fear. I think when you're seeking God and loving how He says to love and living in His will, then He takes care of the rest. If you can believe it (sometimes I can't), He cares more about your heart than you do. And, even better, perfect Love drives out all fear. whoa.