The fearful freedom of friendships

“Well.  You have a secret from me,” he said in the end.  “No, don’t turn away from me.  Did you think I would try to press or conjure it out of you?  Never that.  Friends must be free.  My tormenting you to find it would build a worse barrier between us than your hiding it.” 

The Fox to Orual, from C.S. Lewis’ “Till We Have Faces.”

“How do you make somebody love you without affecting free will?”– Bruce Nolan

“Welcome to my world, son. If you come up with an answer to that one, you let me know.”– God

From the movie, “Bruce Almighty.”

Heaven is love desired and freely given.

Hell is love desired and intentionally withheld--or unthought-of of altogether.

But that’s just how love goes, as Nat King Cole sang:

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.”

Paul agreedwith Cole when he commanded the Roman Christians to "love one another with mutual affection."

Mutual.

I like you, do you like me?  Check the box.

That was how we found out who our friends (and girlfriends) were in kindergarten.

Check the box!

Yes or no!

(In 6th grade came the “maybe box,” and the beginning of game playing…as if we no longer knew if we liked someone or not.)

It all really boils down to being loved and liked by someone who doesn’t have to love or like you. 

This is what we mean when we tell our mothers and fathers that they think we're beautiful because we're theirs.  Of course, they really do think their children are beautiful.  They even think this objectively.  (I know this now as a father.)  But it feels really good when friends, wives, husbands, boyfriends, and girlfriends affirm our likability and lovableness when they have no natural obligation to do so.

It feels supremely better when God gives us tokens of affection.  When he lets us know by His Spirit and through interactions with creation that he actually and truly likes us, as well as infinitely and eternally loves us. 

I thank God that God is love!

I thank Him for first loving me, for “putting Himself out there.”

I thank Jesus for knowing how it feels to be really and truly and finally rejected, as well as how it feels for people to truly and willingly accept Him to the point of dying for Him, just as He died for them.  I know he appreciates those who live for him with all of their hearts. 

God appreciates love--freely desired and freely given.