Smoky Mountain Reflections
August 2014 #150
So
why the “#150” in this title? Well, I decided to start numbering my reflection
articles and I began writing a monthly article about 14 years ago. If I were
counting, this would be article #168 but I missed a few months over the past 14
years so this is actually article #152.
I decided to start at #150 now though, because I can :-). The rest of
this year will have a month and a # and starting in 2015 articles will be numbered
only.
So
what shall I reflect on in #150? Let's tackle tolerance, love, and marriage,
shall we? These are light topics! First let me say "thanks for the
tolerance" to all those enlightened, tolerant individuals who accuse the
pro-life, pro-traditional-family movement of being hateful and bigoted while
trying to force us to accept and fund the results of following their precepts
of a non-traditional, non-biblical lifestyle. You know what funding I am
talking about; they want to use your tax and healthcare premiums to pay for
medications to deal with epidemic diseases and to "terminate unwanted
pregnancies" (murder innocent unborn
children).
These
are political issues but they are also moral issues and the church cannot stand
silently by and politely nod when innocent helpless people are being murdered.
How did we become a society so bent on sacrificing our children on the altar of
materialism and success? It is simple, we are all selfish sinful human beings,
that is why Christ had to suffer and die on the cross. Maybe if we look at this
through the lens of love, with Christ’s help, we can find a better way. The English language falls short on defining
love. We only have one word for it and a lot of meaning has to be carried in
the context. The Greek language, on the other hand, has four words for love: filos (brotherly love), eros (physical love), storge (familial love), and agapa (unconditional love). Notice none
of these definitions speak of feelings, they are all about relationships and
how we function within those relationships. In Saint Paul's famous “love
chapter” to the Church at Corinth, we get some great insights on love. He tells
us what it is and what it is not. First, he tells us that love is not
smooth-talking, prophetic, wise, or appearing to have faith, or appearing to be
self-sacrificial, because without love all of these actions are only one thing,
self-serving. Without faith, forgivness, and love, all of our actions center on
ourselves. And if self-service is at the source of anything we do, it is
without love and therefore only a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal; equal to
nothing, gaining nothing.
God-pleasing
love on the other hand, is selfless and it is made so by Christ’s redeeming
death on the cross. True love can be patient and kind because it selflessly
desires to serve the one to whom patience and kindness is given. Love does not
envy or boast and is not arrogant or rude, because it desires to serve
selflessly the one to whom the honor or deference is given. Love does not
insist on its own way, because it enjoys the object of one’s love having their
way. Love is not irritable or resentful, because it enjoys being pleasing and
pleasant toward others. Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, because that means
someone who is loved is being harmed. Love rejoices with the truth, because
truth is where the Gospel is found. Forgiveness is the glue that binds all God
pleasing relationships and is where the peace that surpasses all human
understanding is found.
A
recent study published in the AFA journal noted that today's young adults have
a number of enlightened prerequisites for getting married. Our young people did
not think these things up. Society instilled these values in them. Here are
some of those prerequisites: 24%
purchase a home; 33% pay for a
wedding; 50% have 1 to 2 years of full
time work under their belts; 51% have a
career underway; 90% finish education; and 91%
be financially independent. Had I applied that last one I would: still
be a single man and would have missed out on over 31 years of marriage to my
best friend; would burn with passion in a violation of the 10th commandment
sort of way; and three of my favorite people would not exist. Maybe getting
married at the age of 21 is too young in the opinion of many, but I say that
all of the above prerequisites can be worked on much better if you have a life
mate at your side to work on them with.
With
God's help we can provide the kind of love that bears all things, believes all
things, hopes in all things, and endures
all things, because true selfless love is connected to the gospel. We know this
because of these three little words in Paul's letter, "love never ends."
If love is eternal it can only flow from an eternal source, and there is only
one eternal being. The omnipresent triune God is the only possible source for a
love that never dies. In marriage, in accordance with God’s design, we get a
little glimpse of what the pre-sin creation must have been like.
I
pray that your summer is blessed with true tolerance and true love, living out
your God-given role in whatever kind of family you are a part of, while holding
up the Biblical model for the family as the anchor in our society for the
selfless commitment of a married couple to each other and to the children they
are blessed to raise.
In Christ,
Pastor Portier
