Devotion for Wednesday, March 11, The Second Week of Lent
Romans 5:8 | God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.
Paul is so set on this theology, which is to say he is so captured by its claim, that he repeats himself from v. 6 magnificently in v. 8. The only difference is his stress on the all-animating word “love.”
What is love? C.S. Lewis wrote The Four Loves to describe four species of it. E.M. Forster spoke of it in Howard’s End almost biblically as the great pearl above all earthly goods. What is love?
If there were a personal God, the approach of that God to love would be a touchstone for the world; it would tell the tale of love at its deepest level. Whatever we make of it, the God of scripture has defined love through a most specific embodiment. Whatever else love may be, love is the dying to save unlovable persons. Love is not waiting for readiness, or the ideal moment for connection. Love is the act of dying to save unlovable persons from direct death.
If you were to go back over the times and occasions you have loved another; or the moments when you have been loved by another, what would you find? I think the tears would flow and the enduring recognition connect in the moments when you were loved by another despite your sin, or when you forgave a person even though they had hurt you so.