Even though Valentine’s Day has moved into our rear view mirror now, it’s still February and technically, “love month” has another couple of weeks left in it. So, in light of that and because of the incredibly compelling nature of the subject that gets so much attention this month, we’ll continue our focus on love for another post or two. After all, love is one of those things that God never tires of teaching us about, right?
Exceptions – Not the Rule ~
Speaking of which, there’s something that came to mind as I was reflecting on the subject . . . There are people I know who are just incredibly easy to love. From the very first meeting with them, they seemed like people who could end up being more than just casual friends. Some of them are part of our “church family” and when I see them coming my way, there’s an instant warmth in my heart. My personal
assessment about those special friends is that anyone who couldn’t love them has a serious malfunction going on in their love mechanism. But then a realization emerges that clouds the moment and sponsors a deep sigh of disappointment. Those easy-to-love people are, many times, the exceptions, not the rule.
Other than the gift of the Holy Spirit, love is easily the most wonderful and powerful force for good that God ever gave human beings, but it can also be the most difficult, frustrating, challenging, and painful thing we ever encounter. That’s because when God commanded us to love one another, He didn’t mean just the easy ones. He also included those “other” people, the ones who are incredibly easy not to love. Perhaps you’ve encountered a few of them along the way. They’re people who make you wish you were somewhere else when you see them coming your way. Sometimes they seem to be the collective embodiment of all those personalities, attitudes, behaviors, and belief systems you find repellent. They’re the ones with whom the prospect of extended close personal contact is about as appealing as wallowing around in a mud hole with an inbred warthog. Being commanded to love those folks can feel more like punishment than a divine appointment.
A Primary Directive ~
Love can be problematic. It can feel overwhelmingly appealing, or thoroughly repulsive, but it is 
undeniably the primary directive God delivered to us. Jesus made it clear that extending love, first toward God and then to others, encompasses every commandment and ordinance He issued. His response to a direct inquiry about which of God’s laws is most important affirms that. Matthew reports it like this:
Jesus said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37–40 NKJV)
Love is easy to talk about, but carrying out the commandment can be another matter. Unfortunately, occasionally I run into one of these walking personifications of things that define the devil’s “happy place.” When that happens, I don’t immediately consider it a divine opportunity to engage with that person. Instead, my fallen nature tends to chime in with alternative suggestions like these:
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- “They don’t look like they’re in a mood to talk to anyone.”
- Or … “Attempting a spiritual conversation with somebody like that could get intense, and this isn’t a good place for that.”
- Or … “They look like a really hard case. Maybe God wants me to brush up on my apologetics and practice on some easier targets and work my way up.”
- Then there’s always this … “What I should do is pray.”
A Difficult Assignment ~
Love can be hard, but it’s not just hard when it comes to those we’d rather avoid. There’s something we need to acknowledge even when it comes to those “incredibly easy to love” people. . . They aren’t always like that – and neither are we. Love obviously has its utopian moments, but those moments can evaporate without warning and everything can change. God Himself experienced that in the earliest
days. Have you ever thought how absolutely effortless it was for God to love Adam and Eve right after He made them? They had no defects on any level, nothing to criticize, and no quirky tendencies that had to be overlooked. They were perfect and you could say with total accuracy that being around them was “perfectly” delightful. But that didn’t last, did it? One day, another “perfect” creature got involved, one who was perfectly evil. When the serpent slithered into the Garden, everything changed. Loving Adam and Eve was incredibly easy until suddenly, it wasn’t.
When those to whom God had given everything started avoiding Him, love became painful. When instead of running to meet Him, they chose to hide from Him, death was claiming victory. If the objects of God’s love were to overcome the lethal consequences of their rebellion and if love itself was to survive, then something radical and incredible had to be done. That’s when love rose up in the face of death and destruction and gave birth to its most awesome power and its greatest benefit … forgiveness. Without forgiveness death wins. Without forgiveness relationships wither. Without forgiveness hearts and lives where living gardens once bloomed. become dry, fruitless wastelands.
No Added Enhancements ~
Love is hard because forgiveness is the price it must pay to survive. Forgiveness doesn’t make love easier, quite the opposite. Forgiveness doesn’t make love more exciting and thrilling. Forgiveness won’t make love painless. Nothing can do that. But forgiveness can make love invincible, and that’s worth it all.
Forgiveness is not about minimizing heartaches, ignoring wounds, accepting betrayals, or just writing off losses. And forgiveness is not a mechanism for getting rid of our baggage and moving on. Jesus 
didn’t suffer hell on a cross for us to accomplish any of those things. Forgiveness is about restoring broken things and reclaiming lost things. It’s about restoring broken relationships, repairing broken hearts, redeeming broken lives, and resurrecting broken plans and dreams. Forgiveness is the awful price love pays to prove that it’s real.
Feels Like an Obituary ~
Reading the daily news in this violent, selfish culture is like reading love’s obituary. In spite of all the times the word “love” pops up, and in spite of all the ways it gets thrown around, the glorious benefits that real love guarantees are hard to find. God challenges us to love enough to forgive. To love enough to forgive means we’re willing to endure enough to restore. To love enough to forgive means we’re willing to hurt enough to heal. To love enough to forgive means we’re willing to lose enough to gain. The price of forgiveness is always paid by the one who suffered the wound. Forgiveness isn’t fair, but then, love isn’t either.
When we stop running away like cowards when love calls us to stand and fight, then there is hope. When once again we begin to love enough to forgive, then love’s incredible power to revive, restore, and redeem will come to life. When love vanquishes our fear, then spontaneous joy, defiant hope, and an unquenchable thirst for righteousness and justice will begin to spring up in the land again.
“TWEETABLES” ~ Click to tweet and share from the pull quotes below. Each one links directly back to this article through Twitter . . .
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- “God’s love rose up in the face of death & destruction & gave birth to its most awesome power & greatest benefit – forgiveness. Without it, death wins, relationships wither, hearts & lives, where living gardens once bloomed, become dry, fruitless wastelands.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
- “Love is hard because forgiveness is the price it must pay to survive. Forgiveness doesn’t make love easier. It doesn’t make love more exciting & thrilling. It won’t make love painless. Nothing will. But forgiveness can make love invincible & that’s worth it all.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
- Forgiveness is about restoring broken things & reclaiming lost things. It’s about restoring broken relationships, repairing broken hearts, redeeming broken lives & resurrecting broken plans & dreams. Forgiveness is the awful price love pays to prove it’s real.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
- “To love enough to forgive means we’re willing to endure enough to restore, willing to hurt enough to heal, and willing to lose enough to gain. The price is always paid by the one who suffered the wound. Forgiveness isn’t fair, but then, love isn’t either.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
- “When we once again begin to love enough to forgive, then love’s incredible power to revive, restore & redeem will come to life. When love vanquishes fear, we’ll see spontaneous joy, defiant hope & an unquenchable thirst for righteousness & justice begin again.” @GallaghersPen (Click here to Tweet)
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© 2023 Gallagher’s Pen, Ronald L. Gallagher, Ed.S. All rights reserved.
Gallagher's Pen ~ 
Another wisdom-filled post my friend. I think the sentence that struck the strongest chord with me this morning was, “Those easy-to-love people are, many times, the exceptions, not the rule.” Reading it, I realized how true that is in my life. I asked myself, “Is pasting a smile on my face and showing kindness really loving that person?” Needless to say, I didn’t like the answer. Interesting enough, your post, which I saw come in before feeding this morning, but delayed until after I’d fed myself, which always comes after all the livestock, etc., reiterates a breakfast discussion I had with my friend Mr. John. As we spoke about the week past and the challenges faced, he expressed how “It would not do him to be in the cattle business because of that so and so had done me the way he did you, he’d get what fer.” I understood and appreciated his emotion-filled thoughts, but I reminded him that as Christian men we have to rise above what our emotions often tell us. I agreed that I wanted to hold that man to what he texted was the price for the product, but had I
“been a bear” and done that, had I “held my ground” and forced him to live up to my standard on integrity, I would not have shown him the same grace that God shows me each day when I mess up. The led to a conversation about “Endless Grace and Boiling Frogs”, which one day might make a great blog post of its own, but the lesson I wanted my young Christian friend to learn is that God’s love and the grace the He always extends to us is the same that we should try to extend to others. In doing so, they’ll one day see how different we are from the world they’re immersed in. It is God’s grace that compels us to love, even the un-lovable. We must love them because God does. Powerful post today sir. Thank you!
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I’m always amazed by you, J.D. I don’ know how you managed to find time to read the piece, much less to offer one of your characteristically gracious responses. So, in light of that, I’m not going to be so wordy in my reaction. I must say, though, that I always love the way you weave in some kind of personal application. That’s exactly what Jesus had in mind when He taught. In my counseling days I occasionally worked with people who had eating disorders. Some would sit down and enjoy a delicious meal and then sneak off to a restroom and “purge.” They would force themselves to vomit out all of the nourishing food they had just consumed before their body had a chance to apply any of the sustaining, strengthening, healing, and growth producing qualities they had exposed themselves to. God bless you for the efforts you make to put the Word to work, and to share what it looks like with others, like Mr. John.
Our love and prayers come with this note, of course, along with our confidence that the living God will meet and exceed whatever needs lie ahead for you, Mrs. Diane, and the rest of the Cross-Dubya family.
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