Connecting the Dots of Love

By: Scott Tolhurst

I once spent a spent a month in a monastery. Yes, there were monks, Gregorian chants, spartan dining, vigil prayers, deep quiet and more manual labour than I'm used to. The month held a host of new experiences. I corked wine bottles, wrestled with ancient granite stone, doubled my Latin vocabulary and enjoyed a nightly sprinkle of holy water from the Abbot. I discovered that monks have names and stories of grace. I tasted of prayer as the "work of God" seven times daily. I surrendered myself to a discipline of silence - waiting to hear God speak. God planted seeds that have rooted in my soul. While much of the fruit from that sowing is still growing underground, I can name at least one blossom.

Early in the month God linked together a series of premises that I have known and preached as single truths. Not one of them is new. Yet God joined them into a chain. Each one is connected and leads to the other. Together they formed an epiphanal moment for me. Here is the chain:

I cannot love who I do not trust.

I cannot trust who I do not know.

I cannot know who I do not seek.

I cannot seek without intentional effort.

There is no effort without cost.

We are called to love God as our highest obligation. It is to be our supreme joy. But it's not always our experience. Loving God carries a measure of confusion, struggle, waiting and pain. It can be hard to love God. Anyone who says otherwise is simply sentimental. To love Him well as He deserves: to love Him consistently as He demands: to love Him foremost as the centre of our living - no one does this on their own. But by grace, God doesn't leave us on our own. He teaches us what love is and what love does. He enables willing hearts to be vessels of devotion. What do we discover?

If our love for God is going to be more than a Sunday morning affection, love has to be linked with trust, and trust leads to intimacy. Intimacy is not isolated from longing. Longing is proved by persistent intentions. Every intention played out has a price. So the chain which begins with the promise of love, ends with the sharp point of a price. "Am I willing to pay the cost to love God well?”

Before you jump to your answer, consider two things. First, this chain is not just a spiritual principle. You live it daily with your spouse, children and friends. Our relationship with God is not excused from the demands of any loving relationship. Second, God did not excuse Himself from the same demands. To love us well, He binds Himself in the chains of grace. To trust us with freedom. To know us better than we know ourselves. To seek us in our brokenness. To make the effort of Incarnation. To pay the price of death. His love chain connects with our love chain and we are bound together forever - joyfully.