Tuesday, October 19, 2010

humanity's broken ability to love

My friend Doug in prayer group a couple weeks ago shared with us his readings and his interpretations of John. He is such an intelligent and unique person. He has a lot of wisdom and has a different perspective on life than I do and some of the rest of our group. This was a little section from his summary and what he took away from John 2:1-2.
                "Jesus came to change our humanity into divine love. He brings his disciples to a wedding feast to reveal our deepest thirst; LOVE. Our desire to love and to be loved.
                Love is the deepest desire boiling inside of us. It is deeper than our desire for power, wealth and reputation; the same things that we hold unto and keeps us from realising Gods identity for us. However, our thirst to be loved is all too often outsompted by a diversion. That diversion is our pursit to be admired. Our quests for acceptance, praise, popularity, and reputation are warped fantasies even perversions of our thirst for love.

             We are all wounded from our failure to receive love because humanity has a broken ability to love. This leads to a humanity collectively seeking love from one another. Yet all the individuals are lonely and feel incapable of being loved. But Jesus leads us to a celebration of love just as he lead his disciples to the marriage feast. In changing the water to wine, Jesus shows he wants to change our broken humanity into divine love. Jesus needs our efforts to do this. The guests at the wedding feast consumed all of their wine early and were disappointed when they had to drink water at the feast. Humanity serves its version of love to one another, but ultimately it does not satisfy and leaves us disappointed and broken. (water) Jesus needed the trust and hard work of the servants to fill the jars to the brim with water. Then he changed it to the best wine. He needs our trust and work to put all of our broken humanity before him. Then he will change it into divine love. Only then can our desire for love be quenched and only then can we begin to share that love(wine) with other people.
                Receiving that love is receiving God's life. This allows me to do things like see people how Jesus sees them. Forgive. Empathize with the poor. Be with the meek. Have compassion. I am less attracted to the idols of power, wealth, and reputation. I can love like God loves."

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