How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?
Part Four: Designed for Relationship[i]
Part Four: Designed for Relationship[i]
Why do we do what we do? What motivates us? Why do we love God or fail to love God? The biblical answers to these questions might surprise you. Join us on a journey of spiritual discovery in our new blog series on How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?
Designed for Relationships
Because God is relational, all reality is relational. God, therefore, designed us for relationship. Henri Nouwen, though separating our relationality from our rationality more than I would, illustrates our core nature.
Somehow during the centuries we have come to believe that what makes us human is our mind. Many people seem to know the definition of a human being as a reasoning animal. But what makes us human is not our mind but our heart, not our ability to think but our ability to love. It is our heart that is made in the image and likeness of God (Robert Durback, Seed of Hope: A Henri Nouwen Reader, p. 197).
Henry Scougal and John Piper more accurately, I think, dissect relational reality. “The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love” (Scougal, The Life of God, p. 62).
How else do we assess the beauty of an invisible heart than by what it loves? Someone might suggest, “By what it thinks.” But clear and accurate thought is beautiful only in the service of right affections. The devil himself is quite an able intellect. But he loves all the wrong things. Therefore his thinking serves evil and his soul is squalid. Or perhaps someone would suggest that we can assess the beauty of a soul by what it wills. Yes, but there is half-hearted willing and whole-hearted willing. You don’t judge the glory of a soul by what it wills to do with lukewarm interest, or with mere teeth-gritting determination. To know a soul’s proportions you need to know its passions. The true dimensions of a soul are seen in its delights. Not what we dutifully will but what we passionately want reveals our excellence or evil (Piper, The Pleasures of God, p. 18, emphasis added).
Face-to-Face, Faith Beings: We Are Worshipping Beings
Designed by God, we are face-to-face beings. In relationship to God, we are faith beings. Faith is the core of the original human personality. That core involves entrusting ourselves to Someone who transcends us, yet draws near to us. In the innermost chamber of our soul resides a worshipping being; the ability to worship from the heart is what makes us human.
By these descriptions, there are no atheists. Everyone must put their trust in Someone or Something. Even Madelyn Murray O’Hair. Consider these excerpts from her diary, found by the IRS in 1999.
A 1959 entry reveals an almost pathetic despair: “The whole idiotic hopelessness of human relations descends upon me. Tonight I cried and cried, but even then, feeling nothing.”
1973 New Year’s Wish List: A mink coat, Cadillac, cook, housekeeper. “In 1974 I will run for the governor of Texas, and in 1976, the president of the United States.” Ironic that in 1976 we elected one of the most committed Christians ever to be president.
In 1977 she wrote: “I have failed in marriage, motherhood, and as a politician.”
One poignant phrase appears again and again. In half a dozen places, O’Hair writes, “Somebody, somewhere, love me.”
Reflecting on her words, Chuck Colson writes:
How telling that this hostile and abrasive person, who harbored nothing but hatred for God and his people, who believed human beings were merely the product of a cosmic accident, would nevertheless cry out to the great void for someone just to love her. What a powerful example of the fundamental truth that we are made for a relationship of love with our Creator, and that we can never fully escape from our true identity and purpose. No matter how much we may deny it intellectually, our nature still cries out for the love we were made to share. To paraphrase the famous words of St. Augustine, even the most bitter atheist is restless until she finds her rest in God (Colson, Prison Fellowship Ministry, 1999).
God is our primal relationship, whether we face it or not, whether we like Him or not. We always live oriented toward God—either with our faces or our backs oriented to Him.
How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?
So, how’s your spiritual love life? Prayerfully ponder:
*If our ability to love is what makes us human, then how human am I? How loving am I?
*If the worth of the soul is measured by the object of its love, then of how much worth is my soul? Who or what is the object of my love?
*If we can assess the beauty of our heart by what we love, then how beautiful is my heart? Who or what do I love?
*Am I loving all the right things or all the wrong things?
*Who or what does my soul delight in? Who or what is my soul passionate about?
*Who or what do I entrust my soul to?
*We are made for a love relationship with our Creator. Is my face turned toward Him or is my back turned toward Him?
Designed for Relationships
Because God is relational, all reality is relational. God, therefore, designed us for relationship. Henri Nouwen, though separating our relationality from our rationality more than I would, illustrates our core nature.
Somehow during the centuries we have come to believe that what makes us human is our mind. Many people seem to know the definition of a human being as a reasoning animal. But what makes us human is not our mind but our heart, not our ability to think but our ability to love. It is our heart that is made in the image and likeness of God (Robert Durback, Seed of Hope: A Henri Nouwen Reader, p. 197).
Henry Scougal and John Piper more accurately, I think, dissect relational reality. “The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love” (Scougal, The Life of God, p. 62).
How else do we assess the beauty of an invisible heart than by what it loves? Someone might suggest, “By what it thinks.” But clear and accurate thought is beautiful only in the service of right affections. The devil himself is quite an able intellect. But he loves all the wrong things. Therefore his thinking serves evil and his soul is squalid. Or perhaps someone would suggest that we can assess the beauty of a soul by what it wills. Yes, but there is half-hearted willing and whole-hearted willing. You don’t judge the glory of a soul by what it wills to do with lukewarm interest, or with mere teeth-gritting determination. To know a soul’s proportions you need to know its passions. The true dimensions of a soul are seen in its delights. Not what we dutifully will but what we passionately want reveals our excellence or evil (Piper, The Pleasures of God, p. 18, emphasis added).
Face-to-Face, Faith Beings: We Are Worshipping Beings
Designed by God, we are face-to-face beings. In relationship to God, we are faith beings. Faith is the core of the original human personality. That core involves entrusting ourselves to Someone who transcends us, yet draws near to us. In the innermost chamber of our soul resides a worshipping being; the ability to worship from the heart is what makes us human.
By these descriptions, there are no atheists. Everyone must put their trust in Someone or Something. Even Madelyn Murray O’Hair. Consider these excerpts from her diary, found by the IRS in 1999.
A 1959 entry reveals an almost pathetic despair: “The whole idiotic hopelessness of human relations descends upon me. Tonight I cried and cried, but even then, feeling nothing.”
1973 New Year’s Wish List: A mink coat, Cadillac, cook, housekeeper. “In 1974 I will run for the governor of Texas, and in 1976, the president of the United States.” Ironic that in 1976 we elected one of the most committed Christians ever to be president.
In 1977 she wrote: “I have failed in marriage, motherhood, and as a politician.”
One poignant phrase appears again and again. In half a dozen places, O’Hair writes, “Somebody, somewhere, love me.”
Reflecting on her words, Chuck Colson writes:
How telling that this hostile and abrasive person, who harbored nothing but hatred for God and his people, who believed human beings were merely the product of a cosmic accident, would nevertheless cry out to the great void for someone just to love her. What a powerful example of the fundamental truth that we are made for a relationship of love with our Creator, and that we can never fully escape from our true identity and purpose. No matter how much we may deny it intellectually, our nature still cries out for the love we were made to share. To paraphrase the famous words of St. Augustine, even the most bitter atheist is restless until she finds her rest in God (Colson, Prison Fellowship Ministry, 1999).
God is our primal relationship, whether we face it or not, whether we like Him or not. We always live oriented toward God—either with our faces or our backs oriented to Him.
How’s Your Spiritual Love Life?
So, how’s your spiritual love life? Prayerfully ponder:
*If our ability to love is what makes us human, then how human am I? How loving am I?
*If the worth of the soul is measured by the object of its love, then of how much worth is my soul? Who or what is the object of my love?
*If we can assess the beauty of our heart by what we love, then how beautiful is my heart? Who or what do I love?
*Am I loving all the right things or all the wrong things?
*Who or what does my soul delight in? Who or what is my soul passionate about?
*Who or what do I entrust my soul to?
*We are made for a love relationship with our Creator. Is my face turned toward Him or is my back turned toward Him?
[i]Developed from materials originally published in: Kellemen, Bob. Soul Physicians: A Theology of Soul Care and Spiritual Direction. Winona Lake, IN: BMH Books, 2007
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