In response to a recent post titled Redefining Love, my closest friend and counselor (my wife) offered an interesting series of comments and questions.
“Please help me to understand. I am afraid that you over think and evaluate everything. Can’t it be easy to love, not such a thoughtful effort? Why such talk of always having to make the choice? Do you really feel that love is always a choice? Is it not different even for your kids? Is there nobody that you are just filled with love for no matter what ever would happen? Isn’t there a love you don’t have to put thought or choice into… a love where it’s just a fact?”
To these questions I answered,
“Interesting questions. I suppose the renewed spirit in me does love as a matter of fact in that I am made in God’s image and God is love. But yet, my soul always has the choice of whether or not to appropriate that love into this current state of being, the flesh.”
As I give these matters more thought, I find myself longing for the transformation of mind and heart (aka Soul) that Romans 12 refers to. Though my flesh craves ownership of my soul, its war with my spirit will not be won. May God show favor in the tension of these battles enabling me to bring my wayward soul into the spirit’s submission more often until the day my salvation is made complete and a new body is granted. In short, I desire to truly begin becoming love during this life. Then, there will no longer be a choice. Love will simply and profoundly be. Love will be.