To love is to risk.
When we pour out love to someone, we risk not being loved in return. In other words, when we love unconditionally, (which is the only real love), we risk rejection. Someone has said, “It is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all.” I agree, yet the pain of unrequited love makes me wonder sometimes about the truth of that saying.
There is a victory that only comes with vulnerability. When betrayal happens to someone, it never comes at the hand of an enemy. Betrayal, by it’s very definition, must be from a friend, a spouse, a spiritual leader, a co-worker, a child, someone that is close to the one betrayed. That is why few things in life are as painful as betrayal.
When betrayal occurs, the tendency of the one betrayed is to start building a wall of protection around the heart. If a pastor hurts a congregant, whether intentionally, (or more often,) unintentionally, the person offended is less trusting than he or she was before the hurt. If another offense comes, the wall of protection (mistrust) grows higher.
In my life, I have built a protective wall around my heart without even realizing it. I was hurt by someone and did not like the pain I felt. Pain hurts!! I went years in a kind of spiritual numbness. I loved God and somehow believed He loved me, but I was basically going through the motions of life, and didn’t know why I felt numb and vaguely (and sometimes acutely) dissatisfied with life.
One day my wife Rita and I were driving home from a conference when I saw a flock of birds flying south for the winter. The beauty of the sky and the sight of the orderly yet uninhibited birds left me breathless with gratitude at being able to see such a sight.
In that simple moment I heard the Lord speak to me, not audibly, much louder!
He said, “David, I have let you see, really see this sight to show you something. In your desire to protect yourself from pain, you have protected yourself from Me, from really living, really loving. in order to appreciate the sunrise, you must go through the long dark night. Don’t be afraid, I am with you even there.”
I got it! Love broke through with an answer to my discontent. Thriving is much better than surviving, even though sometimes surviving is the best we can do. The night will end. The sunrise turns the black to gray, then to a faint blue, then to pink-tinged, and finally the orange and crimson and blue and green of a new day.
So, like George Bailey at the end of the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life”, I said to the Lord: “I want to live again!” Somehow I sensed that He would give me grace to forgive, even forgive myself- and to begin to trust again.
If I never knew sorrow, I could never be comforted- I wouldn’t know healing if I never felt pain. Slowly but surely, like a bitter cold Winter entering into the protracted birthpangs of a radiant Spring, I begin to give myself permission to feel again, to trust again, and yes, to be hurt again… somehow knowing that no matter what, I was “accepted in the Beloved” with the grace to take the risk of Love.
“THO YOU SLAY ME”
I have been buliding a fortress for my flesh
Tried to make it strong so I wouldn’t be invaded
Life that once flowed through me so freely and so fresh
Is stagnant now and fervent love has faded
In this prison of protection and pride
I’m so lonely I’m the only one inside
How could I be so foolish after all You’ve been to me
Help me cast aside these chains of my self-sufficiency
Give me back the trusting heart that sets me free
Tho’ You slay me, Tho’ You lay me in the dust
Tho’ You slay me, still in You Lord I’ll trust
Tho’ no fruit be on the vine or ox in the stall
I’ll never regret giving you my all
Just like Isaac did to Abraham I’ll trust
Tho You slay me
(David Baroni: from the CD “Holy Desperation”)