Greetings,

This is one of those days when legion is in operation and one is not certain just what task to deal with first. Still, there is a feeling in the air…one that perhaps is a spill-over from yesterday, although there wasn’t [not for me] much if any overflow of sentimentality or the usual hoopla associated with Valentine’s Day. To be honest, I did dress up in pink (not red) and white, because that was my way of recalling the day but really, the white skirt had been begging for a wear for weeks and yesterday seemed a good time to grant her wishes.

I really want to stay with the love theme, even though Valentine’s Day has passed. You see, that four letter word, has been bandied about, especially by us English speakers for so long, it would be fair to say that we have perhaps lost light of what is at its heart [no pun intended]. To be sure, it is not ‘an itching sensation that cannot be scratched’, as my English lecturer back in Teachers’ college had proffered, to peals of laughter from me and my classmates, as we all shared insights about words, their meanings and ambiguities. Similarly, it is definitely not the feeling you feel, when you feel a feeling you’ve never felt before, as we would mischievously declare in our adolescent years, of wrestling with feelings and emotions we were told by our elders that we should corral, lest their predictions of…waa swiit yuh wii suuhn suwah yuh, come to pass…Woi!!

For a long time, I understood the concept of a loving God intellectually. However the extent to which I allowed that love to become the center of gravity, with respect to my life and relationships was still in process. Of course God loves me and I love God…that was never in doubt but the how of that love as a life theme was still somewhat elusive…until I read David Benner’s groundbreaking book Surrender To Love. It was through this volume’s words and images that I began to realize, beyond mental assent or mere emotion, that to truly receive and be a channel of love…that is pain-filled in its yearning for the wellbeing and welfare of others, even those who would wish one harm…that does not seek its own [drawing upon the wisdom of I Corinthians 13 and Khalil Gibran]…that rather than being eternally optimistic is instead realistic in an Immanuel acknowledging way, one’s initial and daily response thereafter, ought to be surrender, so that in and by love, one learns, according to Benner, to be “free from the tyrannizing effects of fear” which, if we are honest,  is at the very core of our relational problems, as individuals and within our respective groupings.

What was fascinating for and has remained with me is the statement by the writer that…‘surrender is as much a part of genuine love as it is a part of authentic spirituality.’ In other words, because we were made for love by the One who is love, there is no way to fully comprehend let alone embrace the enormity, not of an emotion but of the divine Himself, outside of abandoning ourselves as the droplets that we are, to the vast ocean from which we came and wherein we will find our true selves.

This surrender to love as I have shared above, requires a daily response, and as I and countless others can testify, the more one surrenders to its enveloping tide, the more one realizes that without such surrender, especially in declaring the Lordship of Jesus Christ over our lives, it is nigh unto impossible, to demonstrate an authentic spirituality.

How then can I end this week’s offering? I will do so with a statement Benner makes in his book that was pivotal to my own and continued surrender. I hope it will have a similar impact for you…

“Regardless of what you have come to believe about God based on your life experience, the truth is that when God thinks of you, love swells in his heart and a smile comes to his face.” 

Till next week…

Grace+