Love!

According to today's copy of The Independent newspaper, "Love, supposedly, is many things.  Blind, if you ask Shakespeare. All you need, says John Lennon. But scientifically compliant? Subject to a set of specified natural laws? Nothing more than a simple mathematical equation? It doesn't sound terribly romantic. Still, it's a prospect that has got matchmakers more than a little excited."

The story is that science can find the perfect match for each one of us!  Whether it's DNA compatibility assessment; or people who smell different, but not too different; or our ability to taste MHC (the major histocompatibility complex - no I don't know what it means, either!) in one another's saliva; the attraction of one to another may be scientifically explained and, therefore, science is capable of pointing us in the right direction in our search for Mr, or Miss, Right!  However, there are many who would insist that the idea that it is possible to boil down romance into a simple, straight-forward, formula is a total non-starter!  There are too many aspects to a realationship - to do with personality; physical attractiveness; beliefs; family background; etc.

Of course, all of that has only to do with human love.  However, there is a greater love than that.  I shared a little about it at the Communion Service in Coatbridge Baptist Church on Sunday.  It's the love of God!  And it is really special.

Many see only the best that I have to offer.   But I know every word I utter - not just the ones that I preach; every thought that enters my mind, and is entertained there - including those about which I would rather not have anyone else know; every deed that I perform - even those unseen by any other human eye.

Many of those things make me less than proud of myself.  Sometimes - all too often! - I see much in me that I don't particularly like.  I sometimes wonder, in moments of real honesty, if others knew me as well as I know myself would they think as highly of me as they do!

The amazing thing is that Father God knows me even better than I know myself!  He knows every thought before it has even entered my mind; every word before I have uttered a sound; every deed - and the true motive behind it.  Yet, such is His love that He still loves me - not because of what I am in public, but in spite of what I am in private.

That's real love; 'agape' love; divine love.  That's a love that, in this life, I can never fully understand.  That's a love that is displayed on a Roman cross as that same God, in the Persona of the Son, bled and died for my salvation.

It's a love that reaches out to every human being, in every age, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, or anything else.  Have you responded, yet, to that love?