Love Never Fails?

At a certain age, you come to recognize that failure is simply woven into the fabric of life.  We see it, experience it- Up close and at a distance.  Personally and within the community around us.  Thank God we don’t have to deal with those Olympic announcers commentating our everyday mistakes: “So Laura, that storytime didn’t go well.  You’ve been a librarian for many years now, can you explain what went wrong?”

But the Bible, this book I believe to be TRUTH (Notice the capital “T”), says in 1 Corinthians 13:8a that “Love never fails.”  Love.Never.Fails.  Hmmmmmm.  (Imagine me pensively stroking my chin.)  Because divorce.  Broken friendships.  Unrealized hopes or expectations.  Prodigal children.  Just an abbreviated list of instances where it seems love totes failed.

My pastor recently spoke about this 1 Corinthians passage.  And he said something I’ve heard before, but it resonated differently this time.  The love in these verses isn’t heart-eyes emoji love.  It’s not my love of consuming all the peanut butter or Elijah's love of watching all the football.  It’s agape, a word meaning unselfish, sacrificial, John 3:16 love.  To put it briefer still: Divine affection.

Watching lived-out agape is to glimpse the face of God.  As Jack Zavada said in his essay about the topic, “Love is not merely an attribute of God, love is His essence. God is fundamentally love. He alone loves in the completeness and perfection of love.”  And the job of believers is to try and model this divine expression as best as possible.  “Christian” literally means “little Christ.”  Consequently those who confess Christ SHOULD be agape personified.  Their power shouldn’t be in exclusion, piety, or regulation, but in open arms, humility, and grace.  Unassuming sacrifice is where Jesus’ power lives, breathes, and enacts REAL change in ourselves and others.

But what does that look like in the daily grind?  In busy homes and schedules?  How about homeschooling a child with multiple special needs, just to see them thrive under a parent’s watchful care.  Choosing life for an in-utero baby with a fatal diagnosis, so he can spend every earthly breath enclosed in loving arms.  Pursuing a relationship with an inmate, sharing educational opportunities and equipping prayers. Working alongside a challenging population of patients, tirelessly offering resources and help. (PS All examples from my people.  They’re the best.  Like they get MANSIONS in heaven and I get the trailer home.)  But agape can also be in the small things: Forgiving someone first.  Pouring his coffee before yours.  Actually LISTENING to your kid jabber about their favorite element from the periodic table.  (Okay, that last one was from my life.)  Sacrifice can be big or little, but it is never, never insignificant.

These past few years have been brutal on the Gross love battlefield.  Rehoming a foster babe and ending the 4 year Ethiopian adoption process nearly destroyed our family.  As parents longing for another child, David and I were crushed x 2.  But Scripture clearly explains that agape is not about ME.  (Weird because everything else is. #jokes) It’s not about my feelings or worries about people’s perception of a situation. However, the Bible doesn't minimize the hardship of sacrifice. Like the difficulty of getting a foster baby away from a stressed-out Mama (ME!) into a more comfortable environment.  Like the heartache of accepting a country’s ruling to close their borders to international adoptions and supporting a vulnerable child there in a different way.  Listen: I’m NOT glorifying our actions.  It was 100% begrudging surrender in both cases.  The opposite of cute or holy or Abraham carrying Isaac up Mt. Moriah. In our eyes, love had failed.  But a change of perspective reveals: A foster toddler in a happy, capable home, an Ethiopian child newly sponsored to attend school, an orphan in India becoming a daughter.  That doesn’t sound like loss to me.  It doesn’t sound like defeat.  Friends, agape is never wasted.  Even while dying on a cross, it is opening a doorway to new life.  Love never fails.

When done in love, nothing is wasted.