Matthew Costner

Ever heard the expression, when it rains it pours? Well, I am beginning to think this old cliché is true. At least right now in my life I feel like the rain won’t stop at all. Through it all though, I have a strange contentment. I know God is going to take care of me, but at the same time I have so many fears about life. This week my fear of giving my heart to another has completely scared me to death.
In the past week alone I have talked with individuals who said either they or their spouse had committed adultery, were unhappy in their marriage, were divorced, and then just today I was at my great aunt’s funeral and witnessed my great uncle’s heartache of her death. I sat there on the third row with the family watching my cousins, uncles and aunts in tears, and then I watched and heard my great uncle say at the graveside that he wished it could be him that died. As I looked over my dad’s shoulder over the cemetery, I saw my own grandfather Costner’s grave, not to mention all the other graves that were there.
This whole concept of love seems to draw so much pain. Whether it comes in the form of hurting for a friend, breaking up or being broke-up with a girl-friend, or the death of a family member or friend, much pain and suffering has to do with this word “love.” Therefore, what is love? Webster’s dictionary says that it is a noun, and that it is…
“(1) strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties (2) attraction based on sexual desire: affection and tenderness felt by lovers (3) affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests (4) warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion (5) the object of attachment, devotion, or admiration (7) unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another, and (8) a person’s adoration of God.”
Being a Christian and all, I wanted to look at Scripture and see what it says “love” is. The first part of 1 John 3:16 gives us our definition. It says, “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us (You could also go to John 3:16 to read this concept more in depth).
Although the dictionary clearly indicates that this word is a noun, it seems Scripture is very clear that this word is a verb for it is more about sacrifice than anything else. I think this dichotomy of the two parts of speech is interesting for the description of this word. I truly believe that the world or the enemy speaking through the world would want us to believe that to love we just have to have a feeling, whereas to biblically love there has to be sacrifice. The reality is that if the enemy can get us to think that sacrifice isn’t necessary then Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross doesn’t hold as much weight. No wonder John wrote later on in this section that we need not only love by our word and tongue (speaking kindness but stopping short of proving that word), but in deed and in truth (carrying out that which we say, which often requires…here it is again…sacrifice).
Sacrifice is not easy to do, especially when it may require sacrificing for people who don’t seem to be loveable (meaning we have to have humility), or when losing that person is inevitable (and I mean death here, which means we have to have faith). The reason these situations aren’t easy is because both are required of us to do if we are going to love during our lives. How do I know? Well, we aren’t always loveable and we all are going to die, and the two of these cause hurt!
So why love each other if loving causes hurt? And, I don’t want the answer, because God said so! Well, I believe the answer is simple. We Christians love because we can’t help but love. If Christ is in our hearts, then we can’t do anything other than love because God is love (1John 4:16b). To put it another way, if we don’t love then Christ doesn’t dwell in us.
So for those of us who have been hurt or scared by love recently what are we to do? Unfortunately, I don’t think there is anything for us to do except keep on keeping on. I guess taking the risk of loving and being loved in return is worth more than the pain it may bring. I guess Alfred Lord Tennyson knew this too when he coined the phrase “Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” Sure, my feelings are hurt right now, but I took the risk of loving and it was worth it because there have been far more good days than bad days. I hate to assume anything, but I think if we all think about our lives I would imagine most of us (98% or so) can say that life has been as good as it is because of love.
However, we are all at different points in our life of how we view love. Just as I have seemed to have a rough week in the “love” category, some of you are experiencing love to be wonderful by having gotten married recently, fallen in love, seen a baby born, or whatever. One thing is for sure, if someone (and by someone I mean Jesus) hadn’t defined loved for us about 2000 years ago we wouldn’t know what love is for we would be stuck sitting around trying to come up with a feeling associated with it rather than recognizing it as a sacrifice. Yes, love is sacrificial, but praise God for sacrifice!