Yesterday, I sat for awhile... and stared at a picture on the wall. It's a picture of our grandson, Archer, staring back at the world, and I could see nothing but joy in his eyes. His mother was holding him in her arms and her eyes sparkled with the same unfettered joy. It was compelling, and I couldn't turn away from its radiance. As every preacher knows, while we only have one word for love in English, there are several words for love in the Greek language. "Agape" is something like God's love. It is far bigger than self and counts neither giving nor receiving. "Philia" (as in Philadelphia) is the love of friend for friend, and it can be very deep, even sacrificial. Eros is an intimate love, from which we get the word erotica. It is tempting to dismiss it as lust, but in truth...it, too, can be a powerful expression of deep feelings and true commitment. Then there is "storge," which is a general affection that people share when they are related in some way. There is room for all of these "loves" in our lives (although the latter three can be contaminated with self and sin)... but when I looked into Kendra's and Archer's radiant faces, I knew that I was being blessed with a love that I cannot even express. My heart filled with joy, my eyes watered a bit, and I knew for sure that I would do or give up anything for either one of them.
There are others who have touched my heart in depth as well. My wife, Sherry, our daughers, our granddaughters, and our little great-grandson, Donald, are at the top of this list. I rejoice when I hear their good news or see their smiles, and I'm burdened when they feel sad and troubled. It will always be so... because I love them in a way that I cannot find the words to express... and I find that time and distance do not diminish the depth of this sort of love. For instance, I haven't seen Donald since he was an infant, and I suspect that I won't see much of him as he grows up because he lives in North Carolina ...but when I stare at his beautiful face and see his wonderful twinkling eyes, I love him with all of my heart and, even across three generations, I feel a "oneness" with him. In short, with people you truly love, their joy is your joy, and their pain is your pain. You can't take all of their pain away, or even make them happy by yourself, but like God, you will always be present to them. I can't imagine hurting any of them in any sense of the word!
It's been more than two years now since Sherry and I took our dog, Nikki, to the Vet. Her pain was non-stop and she was getting up in years, but still, I intially thought that we were making a routine visit. Until I found out it wasn't, that Sherry could know longer bear her suffering, and that it would be Nikki's last ride. When we arrived at the Vet's office, he conducted the same examination he had conducted a dozen times before, and when he finished, he reached the same conclusion: Nikki's condition was bad and would only get worse. So, the three of us went into a back room, and someone gave Nikki a shot, and she was quiet... as we held her. All three of us (Sherry, Nikki, and I) were down on the floor, and I remembered the times when she and I walked through the woods together in Michigan, and how she would run like the wind when I let her off the lease. I looked into her eyes, and I wanted to cry out, "Stop this. Right now! I will leave her here until the drug wears off, pick her up as I always do, and pay you for your time." But the Dr. came in and gave her a final shot. Her heart stopped and my heart broke. I looked into her eyes and my heart broke... at a depth that I didn't even know I had. Her face, though not as cute as Archer's and Donald's, was beautiful to me, and her eyes, though not as lively as theirs, contained the same inexpressible love that I saw yesterday, when I stared at the pictrure on the wall.
Oh, the heights and depths of honest-to-God, no-strings-attached love. In English, I have only one word to use for "love," and I use it to say "I love ice cream," and "I love America." In Greek, I could use other words- some spiritual, some relational, some physical- and in Hebrew, I could say, "I would die for you-ani met aleha," or "You are my soul-nishoma sheli." Actually, these do get at some of what I am trying to say... but they fall short. The sort of love that I have in mind "hangs on a tree and forgives." This, of course, is God's love... and I'm not claiming to reach that high. But more and more, I encounter a love that both surrenders and triumphs; that yearns to fly, but never alone; and laughs and cries when someone or something that is a part of it... is born or dies. Good bye, Nikki, and as for the rest of you, Poppy will be around for a while.
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