Running Through Fire

“Love hurts- but sometimes, it’s a good hurt, and it feels like I’m alive.” -Incubus

Some of the more pessimistic and/or self-serving dowhatyouwant camps like to say that, “You can’t change who you are.”  So we seek sex; pornography, if there is no sex to be found. Drugs; pop tarts if we are uncomfortable with needles. Fantasy; video games and books if reality is too hard to confront. We try to ignore the fact that these urges seem so unnatural at times. Eventually, after enough pursuit, they are no longer natural, but become our most basic desires. My friends, we have  already changed who we are, and most of us are only vaguely aware of it.

These things that we keep using to try and find our identity are rooted in a lack of love. Sure, we may seek them in order to feel loved, or in order to ignore the fact that we feel as though we are not, but when it comes down to it, these things are empty. They are viewed as fulfilling, or worthy of being sought, but only because they bring us pleasure.

The thing I’m finding is that pleasure and feeling “good” and having it easy do not equate to true goodness.

And in actuality, this is why we won’t look for love in Christ. Many of us understand that to sacrifice one’s life for another is a very loving thing to do, but that love that asks us to enter into relationship requires that we step into who we really are because it is entering into a relationship with the One who made us, the One who knows who we really are. So love is no longer just a mushy feeling that gives you tingles like a kiss under your ear, but it is a transforming, uncompromising force for our own good. We just do not, in fact, want to be transformed. And why? Because transformation sucks. It often hurts, and is, at its most relieving, is mildly irritating.

Because love does not compromise, we would seek the easier route. We would try to find our solace in the things of the world rather than sit in love’s arms. Rather than realize that love has self-control, we would give into our impatience and be overly-physical with the ones we love. Rather than realize that love is kind, we would pout and swear and throw things when we don’t get what we want.

We were not made to be this way. It is not the true intention of our Creator to have us looking for self-satisfaction in things that He did not intend to exist. We were made to seek justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. His grace, given through the example, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, enables us to do what we were made to do. We don’t have to worry about doing it. It is already within us when we accept His Spirit.

I know, I know, there’s so much jargon. I guess my point, if I had any, was this:

If you want to know who you really are, give yourself to others, and give yourself to God. It’s not easy, but that’s only because we’ve been feeding on the lie so long. Let’s trade in the fatty and sugary taste for what will actually sustain us. Let’s take off our masks.

Let love be without hypocrisy.

May it be so!