So, are you reading this having emerged from your rose petal filled bath that the beloved just ran for you? Perhaps you are browsing the internet en route to the airport for an exotic away break that has been organised as a surprise? Or maybe you are counting the minutes before you can dash off slip into that hot little number and join in the great loved-up festival that has become Valentine’s Day? No matter, for Ash Wednesday yesterday, with its talk of reflection and a spot of self-denial. Let’s focus on the less challenging face of love that is represented by all things on the 14th Feb!
However, there are parallels in both Ash Wednesday and Valentine’s Day as both have love at their centre. When Jesus fasted for forty days he did so as preparation for his death and resurrection. The line ‘God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son’ is familiar to most believers, but I wonder how many of us have pondered to really think about the love the Son had for us. Just think if he has ducked out post Gethsemane and decided to not go through with it? What would a world without God’s love at its centre truly look like? Without God’s love there would be no starting point for anything else. We would quite simply be without place or indeed purpose.
Similarly, the love-in that may be going on for us tonight is a small refraction of the love that God has for us. Which brings me to the title of this post, can we all possibly be God’s one and only, especially when he calls us to love Him with singular and total devotion? Surely there are favourites? Or ways and means of becoming favourites, but the truth couldn’t be further from it. Recently, I re-read The Parable of The Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32) and realised that there are three sorts of love being expressed: the first the one of desperation and remorse of the Prodigal himself, who says simply:
“Father I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.” Luke 15:12
Then there is the love that stems from a place of obligation, that of the irate second son who harbours deep resentment due to the lack of recognition he has received even though he has loved:
“Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me a goat so I could celebrate with my friends. “Luke 15:29
And finally there is the love of the Father himself; who runs to the Prodigal (verse 20) and pleads with his second son (verse 28). He chooses to shower unconditional favour on them both. Here is the interesting thing; both Sons were lacking and in desperate need of God’s love, both were prodigals. The first is initially separated from it because of shame, the second because of anger. The first had foolishly thought he could get by without the Father’s love, the second thought he had to jump through hoops to have the Father’s love, tragically missing the point that it was all his to begin with (verse 31). Speaking with a friend of mine over glasses of red, we discussed which Son we were. She said she was definitely a ‘One’r ‘ the Prodigal, I said I definitely veered to the ‘Two’er’, having barely had a colourful past to speak of, but often feeling left out of the fatted calf celebrations and more than occasionally hacked off by late dash One’rs seemingly getting all of the glory and all the calf! But the truth is both of us are and continue to be in need of the Father’s love and he meets us in our own special way. It doesn’t get more custom-made than that. The same God who created everything, meets us how we are and loves us for it. If that isn’t true love I don’t know what is.
