September 18 - 1 Thessalonians 5: Perfection of Love

Often I am surprised by my blindness to my own sin.   This morning was one of those times when the Holy Spirit gently guided me to a place of recognition of sin in my life and then He took me beyond identification to the place of knowing my inability to do anything real about it.  In particular, this relational sin is a larger temptation when I'm weary from pouring myself out in relationships and then I feel a sense of entitlement to be filled up - emotionally, socially, physically, mentally, or spiritually.  This can especially manifest itself with my husband and demanding that he meet this "need."  Which means that as I relate to him, I'm paying more attention to the impact his words and actions are having on me than I am looking for what's going on inside of him.   One more display of my imperfect love.

The wrap-up that Paul gives to this first letter to the Thessalonians, contains a lot of encouragements for loving others that I feel woefully unable to meet.  (Reminds me again of 1 Corinthians 13.)

Get along among yourselves, each of you doing your part. Our counsel is that you warn the freeloaders to get a move on. Gently encourage the stragglers, and reach out for the exhausted, pulling them to their feet. Be patient with each person, attentive to individual needs. And be careful that when you get on each other’s nerves you don’t snap at each other. Look for the best in each other, and always do your best to bring it out.

Be cheerful no matter what; pray all the time; thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live.  (5:13-18)

In my confession and defeat, I read these overwhelming admonitions from Paul.  I have to take a breath and let the Spirit guide me to the truth that He alone is making me "holy and whole" (5:23).  In Him alone is the perfection of love.

"No matter how much an individual does through his own efforts, he cannot actively purify himself enough to be disposed in the least degree for the divine union of the perfection of love."  (John of the Cross, quoted in 66LL)

Crabb's words reflect the frustration I feel with this process,

"You are in a good place.  You're losing confidence in your own resources for steering your way through life.  That loss of confidence, that dying to self, what you feel as frustration, is opening your ears to hear what [God] says in this fifty-second love letter.  It is this:

"Your frustration with everything else, including yourself, makes it possible to turn in deeper dependence to [God].  Your weariness requires the strength of supernatural love to continue serving [Him].  Your haunting sense of futility shuts you up to a kind of endurance that can be sustained only with hope in My Son's return."  (66LL)