The Question of Love

The song, by Matt Maher, says, "Your love defends me." It talks about God as our strength and joy, our refuge, our "safe place" as it were. And all of this is true ... with the possible exception of the claim, "Your love defends me."

Scripture is abundantly clear. No one can separate us from the love of Christ (Rom 8:35-39). In that text, Paul lists a host of horrors from "tribulation" to "famine," "persecution" to "sword." He assures his readers "that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom 8:38-39). Beyond that, there are lots of references to God as "refuge" and "strength" (Psa 28:8; Psa 46:1; Psa 59:16; Jer 16:19). Too often for me to list the Psalms describe God as a fortress. So ... "Your love defends me," right?

On the other hand, Scripture is also full of suffering for God's people. Not "maybe" but "surely." We are told to "count it all joy" (James 1:2) and rejoice (Rom 5:3-5). Peter wrote, "To the degree that you share in the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing" (1 Peter 4:13). It's not a surprise; it's a plan (Php 1:29). It's a sure thing (2 Tim 3:12). So in what sense does "Your love defend me"?

The problem here is not that God is an inadequate defense. We know He works all things together for good to those who love Him (Rom 8:28). The problem is in our understanding of "love." We believe (now) that "love" means "nothing bad ever happens." We think that love will do all it can to keep unpleasantness away from the loved one. The only reason anyone we love suffers anything at all these days is simply that we're not omniscient or omnipotent and can't actually make that happen. We would if we could, because that's what love does.

I disagree. I think that even humanly speaking that's clearly not love. What loving parent won't take their kids to be poked with painful needles in order to prevent them from getting deadly diseases? We don't prevent all suffering. Or we shouldn't. Because in hard times people grow, strengthen, learn. Just as the Bible says, "We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope" (Rom 5:3-4). If tough times produce that, is it really love to deny that to our loved ones?

I think our current culture is an example of what happens when helicopter parents do their best to prevent anything unpleasant from happening to their little ones. Their children end up weak, angry, easily offended, utterly self-centered with a sense of entitlement. We know the axiom, "No pain, no gain," but we've ignored it and had no gain. That's not what our loving Father does. He allows suffering because of love and He uses hardships because of love and, by all the difficulties and joys we face, He conforms us to the image of His Son (Rom 8:38-39) because He loves us. It is a great comfort to know that He doesn't allow more than is best for us. It is more comfort to know that He always does what's best for us, so that when what we're experiencing isn't our choice of "good times," we can have absolute certainty that our loving Father is allowing it for good to shape us into the image of His Son. His love didn't fail to defend me. His love is better than that.