A Love Story

Once upon a time, a Prince was riding in his carriage when he glanced out the window and right into the eyes of a beautiful young lady. In the days that followed he returned to the area and had the opportunity to meet the young lady and quickly fell in love with her. His dilemma was how to make her his bride.

He could have ordered her to the palace and used his royal position to force her to marry him, but even a Prince would like to feel the girl who married him did so because she wanted to.

Finally, the Prince decided to leave the Palace and move into the neighborhood where the young lady lived and get an ordinary job as a carpenter. He would learn to know the people of the neighborhood, including the young lady, in hopes that she would come to love him for who he really was as a person. Only then would he ask for her hand in marriage.

That is what he did, and when she did, in fact, come to love him, only then did he reveal to her that he was the Prince.

This love story, told a century ago by the Danish theologian, Soren Kierkegaard, is really a parable of God's love for us.

Like the Prince, God fell in love -- not with just one young lady -- but with the whole world. God longed to enter into a living relationship with the world so that all could live happily everafter. But how? God could have commanded our love, but love that is not voluntarily given is not love.

John tells us: "God showed his love for us by sending his Son into the world, so that we might have life through him." [1 John 4:9]

First, as an infant, then as a young man, Jesus came to meet us. As a carpenter and a traveling teacher he moved among us. When some responded to his love, he revealed his full nature as the Son of God.

If you like big words, we call this the "Incarnation." However, if you do not ordinarily think in theological terms, I invite you to join me in calling this a "love story." It is a Love Story that begins with the Creation Story and takes us to the foot of the cross.

"This is what love is:
it is not that we have loved God,
but that God loved us and sent his Son
to be the means by which our sins are forgiven."
[1 John 4:10]

The Prince in Kerkegaard's story was wise enough to recognize that the only way he could win the love of the beautiful young lady was to become involved in relationship with her neighborhood. Likewise, God came to live among us and show us love in the very human person of Jesus.

When my son Andrew was 4, he said to me one morning after failing to get his way: "Daddy, I don't love you today!" I picked him up and gave him a big hug and replied: "But I love you, lots and lots!"

"But Daddy," he protested, "you can't love me if I don't love you. That's not cooperating."

How many times have we, by our words or deeds, said to God:
"I just don't love you today." But that doesn't keep God from loving us, does it? God reaches out and lifts us up and hugs us with another beautiful day of life.

And should we feel led to protest God's continuing love, doesn't God say to us, as I felt led to say to Andrew: "But I do love you, lots and lots."

"Dear friends, if this is how God loved us,
then we should love one another."
[1 John 4:11]

Herman Kauffman