“Maybe I just need to love ______ more.” I thought to myself as the tension between us continued to rise.
“Love is patient… So I could be more patient. Love is kind and I could be more kind. Love believes all things, so that’s the answer, more love.”
That’s what I believed until I found myself with an irreconcilable relationship. Broken with very little hope of it ever being repaired, and it has to be that way for numerous reasons.
I didn’t really realized I’d hoped love would solve all the problems until I was in another situation.
At my Dad’s bedside. I thought that if I kissed him enough, held his hand long enough, love on him enough, he would wake up. I thought if I told him I’d make him cheesecake, key lime pie and all the popcorn he wanted if he would just wake up from his coma. But then, he died.
I was driving for several hours one night with tears pouring out of my eyes asking God why my love wasn’t enough…
I loved that person who I no longer talk with. I loved with everything I had.
I loved my Dad as best as I knew how. I truly believed with all my heart that the love of not just me but my entire family would wake him up.
But my love wasn’t enough…
I was thinking this week, maybe you have felt the same? Maybe your love wasn’t enough to keep your spouse from leaving? Maybe your love wasn’t enough from keep someone you loved from having to suffer from cancer? Maybe your love wasn’t enough to hold on to the person you cared about? Maybe your love wasn’t enough to protect your child from being hurt.
Love is powerful, but sometimes it is not enough…
This week I came across 2 Corinthians 5:14, “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died.”
I read that and to be honest, I don’t like the word “compel.” Another translation said, “Controls.” I didn’t like that either. Maybe it’s because I knew someone who would say if you love someone enough they’ll do anything for you. This person used “Love” as a manipulating tool.
So, I decided to look it up in the Greek and what I found was not what I was expecting:
1. To HOLD TOGETHER
1. any whole, lest it fall to pieces or something fall away from it
2. To HOLD TOGETHER with constraint, to compress
1. to press together with the hand
1. to hold one’s ears, to shut the heavens that it may not rain
2. To press on every side
1. of a besieged city
2. of a strait, that forces a ship into a narrow channel
3. of a cattle squeeze, that pushing in on each side, forcing the beast into a position where it cannot move so the farmer can administer medication
3. To Hold Completely
1. to hold fast
1. of a prisoner
2. metaph.
1. To be HELD BY, closely occupied with any business
2. in teaching the word
3. to constrain, oppress, of ills laying hold of one and distressing him
5. to be HELD WITH, afflicted with, suffering from
6. to urge, impel
1. of the soul
So, my love may not always be enough. It wasn’t enough to keep a relationship. It wasn’t enough to keep my Dad here. But God’s love is ENOUGH to hold me together even when I am utterly broken apart.
His love can hold my pieces together until they come together again. His love can resurrect parts of my soul that have died.
My love is not enough, but His Love is and until I can feel it again— his love will be.
