“Each one of us here today will at one time in our lives look upon a loved one who is in need and ask the same question: We are willing to help, Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them - we can love completely without complete understanding.”
– From the Rev. John Maclean in a sermon, as written by his son, Norman Maclean in his memoir, "A River Runs Through It and Other Stories."
The clip of the sermon and reflections from the movie:
"we can love completely without complete understanding." -- That's probably overstating things a bit. We love rather poorly even when we do have understanding. But, the impulse behind this still got me thinking ...
One of the hardest things I've had to learn over the years involves my complete and total inability to produce change in anyone else, even those I love deeply. Whether it be in my church or my family or among my friends or my community, those I love the most are those that I want what is best for and those I want to see change in the most. As a pastor and minister of the gospel, I have greatly longed to see people know God and walk with Him and have worked hard - devoted my life - to help people do that. I want my family to love Jesus and know Him. I try not to be pushy, try to be a real person, try to be available, compassionate, and at the same time, firm in my beliefs regarding what is true. But, as I've grown older, I've come to realize that change isn't a method and it's not really something that we can produce in others. Try as I might, I more often than not find myself bumping up against my human limitations. And, that sometimes frustrates me. But, then I think about how stubborn I am and how hard it is for me to change, apart from a miracle of God's Spirit, and I understand better. We are all just finite humans, limited and dependent upon grace.
I was thinking and praying about this today and the quote above from a sermon from Norman's father came to mind from the movie and the book, A River Runs Through It. In the movie, Rev. Maclean says this as he is grieving and reflecting on his son Paul's life, and death. No matter how much he tried to teach, lead, and direct his son, he couldn't save him from the direction he was headed. Paul was his own person making his own decisions with his own trajectory, his own agency. At the end of it all, all that Rev. Maclean could do was to give it to God and say, "but we can still love them."
Can I love others without being in control of them? Can I love others when they go another direction, disregard me, reject me? When they don't love me back? When my love doesn't "work" to produce change? Can I love others when all that I try to do for them fails or is ignored? As Christians, we have to ask ourselves these question regularly because our call is to love God and love people, everywhere we go. Even when they ignore you or don't receive it or listen or even when they oppose you. Because that is what Jesus did for us and it is His life that lives in us. The call to follow Jesus is the call to love. That isn't a sappy love that doesn't mean anything or that just accepts whatever someone does as good and true or that has no form. No, God's love is weighty and full of substance and character and hope. It is a love that stands rooted in who God is and His goodness and truth and lives sacrificially. The true love that transforms us flows out toward others and doesn't expect to be returned.
I've thought a lot about Rev. Maclean's reflection in that sermon. When I first saw that movie and read that book when I was in college, it struck me as a weak statement, as resignation. If we see someone flailing, we have to stop them! Rescue them! Change things for them! That's what love is, I thought. Strength requires intervention, leadership, change, rescue, turnaround. But, the older I get, the more that I realize that the real strength that Rev. Maclean was displaying was that of trust. He couldn't change the future for his son that he loved with his whole being. He tried, but could not rescue him. But, that didn't mean he would stop loving. And, if we offer that love, even if it is rejected, that is what is required of us. Our hope, after all, is in God.
And, ultimately, it is God who changes us. As Jesus said in John 3, "unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” And, "unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God." God has to do the work of making us alive, of opening our eyes, of saving us. Just yesterday, I was remembering a moment 30 years ago this month. I was a freshman in college at Mississippi State University. I had just been through a breakup with a girl I really cared for and I was quite discouraged. I was homesick and was considering transferring closer to home. I was incredibly lonely, not in church, not connected to other Christians. I had experienced salvation years before, and was a child of God, but I was living for myself and was headed nowhere, eighteen, alone, and rather depressed. It was a Friday night in the dorm and everyone was out but me. The dorm was quiet. I decided to finally get a shower, and it was in the dorm shower alone that I heard this still, small voice echo through my soul: "Your life was meant to serve Me. You'll never be happy unless you serve Me." It was God and it was like a thunder clap and lightening bolt all at once. It was a voice inside of me but outside of me at the same time. I was so far away from God, lost in myself and rebellion and pride and depression. But, out of nowhere and everywhere at the same time, God's Voice broke through it all and was strong and compassionate and hopeful and wise and full of direction. My problem was I was trying to serve myself. God reminded me in that instant that my purpose was to serve Him. I was looking for happiness apart from God. God spoke to me that my happiness would only be found in Him. Clarity broke through the fog and it was supernatural. I called my Dad and told him. He pointed me to Jesus. I started reading the Bible. But, in a few weeks, I began to drift, not knowing where to connect or how to live. But ... God kept coming after me. Again and again. Around 6-7 months later through a series of events, my life was transformed. But, it was that moment in the shower right at 30 years ago, February, 1993, that God broke through and I've never forgotten it. Later would come a more full commitment and then after that, a call to ministry. I wanted everyone to know this God who loves us and gave Himself for us.
My mistake, though, has always been when I take it upon myself to try and produce the change in others. Everyone needs an encounter with God. Everyone needs a touch from God's Spirit in that place of despair. We all need God's love to pour into our hearts and call us out from ourselves and into His light. I cannot produce that in anyone else. I can only point to Jesus who makes all things new. And, I can love without expecting anything back in return.
So, all of this reminds me that the greatest thing I can do is to love God, love people, pray for others, and ask God to work in the lives of the people I love - and those I don't yet know. We all desperately need to see Jesus, for God to break through, for Christ, by His Spirit, to make all things new.
