Love's Cost

 

Love’s Cost

19 May 2018

Wedding of Ariana Nicole Millias and Jacob Frederick Giffin

Trinity Episcopal Church

Ashland, Oregon

The Very Rev. Fr. Tony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.

Eph. 4:25-5:2; Psalm 67; 1 Cor 13:1-13; John 15:9-12

I once asked my father how it was that you could tell if you had found your one true love, your “one and only.” He looked pained at the question, and said, “it doesn’t really matter if you think you have found your one and only. Many people think they have their one true love, only to discover as they age and change that it was a short-lived emotion. And their marriages don’t last. Don’t ask whether you have found your one and only. You should ask what you need to do today to make the one you love your one and only. Because you don’t find a true soul-mate—you make one through actions each day.”

I thought my father was being terribly un-romantic. But I knew he was deeply and hopelessly in love with my mother.  And that, after fifty years.

I have come to realize that he was describing the only kind of romance that lasts—one that is strengthened and renewed each day, through thick and thin, by the actions that show and build mutual respect, love, and passion.

The reading from Corinthians that we just heard is often misunderstood.  Because it is often read at weddings, people think that Paul is talking about romantic love.  But Paul is talking about love itself of any kind.  He says that love is not just an emotion that is felt and experienced, but a condition of the will.  He knows that love as emotion, like any passion, can be fleeting or unpredictable.

“When you love someone, you are patient and kind with that person.  … are not jealous of them… you don’t try to show them up.  You don’t talk down to them, or act rudely toward them.  You don’t try to have your own way at their expense, nor do you get annoyed or resentful at them.  … When you love someone, you put up with whatever they do, you trust whatever they say, you hold every hope for them, and you are willing to endure anything for them.  When you love, you never stop loving.” 

Love here is not just a feeling we experience or suffer.  It is an active way we behave, the way we treat the beloved. 

Love in this sense is a type of sacrifice, a limitation on our freedom and our will. 

For Paul, love by definition places constraints on our freedom.  That’s why he says at one point, “In love, be like slaves to one another” (Gal. 5:13).  Paul knows that love is costly.  It involves constraints, not reducible to mere rules.  

Francoise Sagan, near the end of her life said she was satisfied and had no regrets.  The interviewer said, “Then you have had the freedom you wanted.”  Sagan replied: “Yes… I was obviously less free when I was in love with someone . . . Apart from that, … I’m free.” 

Love is always a risk.  We often are afraid of trusting our fragile hearts to someone else, especially if our heart has been bruised or broken.  But love is a gift from God, and refusing love, not loving, is an option that we take only at the peril of our souls.

C. S. Lewis writes: “Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken.  If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even an animal.  Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness.  But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change.  It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.  The alternative to tragedy, or at least the risk of tragedy, is damnation.”

Today Ariana and Jake you are making each other important promises in the presence of God, the saints and angels, family, and friends.   You will promise to love, comfort, honor, and protect each other, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to each other as long as you both live. 

May God bless you to keep and honor these promises.   Be sure to take time each day to listen to each other.  Be sure to allow each other space.  Be honest with each other.  Be kind to each other.  Help each other go easier on yourselves. 

Like love, this vow is not reducible to a mere set of rules.  Like Love, this vow demands all, demands perfection.  And no one of us is perfect.  So I also pray, that when your imperfections hurt the other, as they are bound to, may God bless you to seek forgiveness from each other, and to forgive each other.  That, after all, is what love is. 

May your love be a source for you to share God’s gifts with others.   Be hospitable, and continue enjoying your friendships.  I hope that God blesses you with children, because I know that both of you desire this, and believe that the two of you will be fabulous parents.  That is part of love as well. 

May the vows you take today make your love firmer, and more alive.  May your love and marriage last as long as you both live, be a crown upon your foreheads, and grow into the great eternal dance of light that surrounds the throne of God.  

In the name of God, Amen.