You Do Not Love out of Weakness, but out of Strength
There are things that I am not comfortable talking about. They’re not who I see myself as being, and they’re not things that I’m in touch with…yet these things which make me want to glance away, to pretend that they’re not there, they are what make me who I am.
Your friend told you, “There is nice and there is naive. You’re on the naive side. Hurt so often. Don’t you ever learn?” It is true that you have suffered a certain pain, and it’s not one that you can ever forget. It is true that you’ve been willing to put yourself out there, that you have been willing to suffer. You have been willing to put yourself on the line—your heart, your mind, your soul. But it is also true that you did not do so without a goal.
You understand something deep; something meaningful. You understand that being hurt isn’t a sign of weakness or naivety. You understand that strength is not an absence of hurt; it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice, endurance, kindness; love. You understand that Jesus, who endured all for you, showed that strength is DEFINED by the ability to be hurt on behalf of others. It is DEFINED by the ability to overcome. It is DEFINED by its endurance.
It is not naivety—no, on the contrary, it is your confidence in Christ in you. The confidence that He put Himself out there. That He was hurt by those He loved. That His love, like yours, was enduring; that it put others first. It was sacrificial. And like your love, some rejected it, but for those who embraced it, it was life-changing. It was valued beyond even your own comprehension.
You know that as Christ sacrificed, so do you. And you know that just one person succeeding because of the strength that you choose to demonstrate—just that one, lonely, searching, desperate soul—makes it worth it.
You love not out of weakness, but out of strength. You are hurt, but not destroyed. Your confidence is in Christ. You love because He first loved you. (1 John 4:19)
I love you so much. Eternity is so much brighter because of you. I do not want an eternity without your strength, and neither does God.
