Update on Love

One of the reasons I hurried back from my lightening quick trip to California last week was to be with my good wife (not that I have others, such as a bad wife) for our anniversary. Yes, when we were 25 and 22, respectively, we had the bright idea of getting married on Valentine's Day. It may not be unique, but it allows you to buy one card for your beloved, instead of enriching Hallmark by paying for two.

We got married 29 years ago. I know this is a blog to discuss NET things--and that's coming--but indulge me a bit to tell you about my girl. Lisa is one of the sweetest persons you'll ever meet. And when she is not that--which is very rare--she doesn't kill you with snake eyes. She's been the faithful mother of our three kids since before each of them were born. And she continues to be so (they're now 24, 22, and 20, whew!), thinking and praying for them each day, sending pictures, and quotes, and stories, and occasional care packages to wherever they are in the world. My wife is not a complex woman, but she's still a woman, complex enough to a man like me. She's faithful and supportive and quietly puts up with things others would not. She's actually a Christian. And I'm a very blessed man. I miss her these days because she's in the West Coast taking a course, and the house is too big without her. Fortunately, our daughter is with us this year, and she will make sure Dad eats and sleeps, even if ocassionally.

Tonight I came back from an evangelistic meeting preached by Dwight Nelson in South Bend. The subject was Hell, a hot topic any day. The truth is that this is one of the clearest opportunities to talk about the true character of God vs. the medieval notion that God delights to turture forever any who choose to rebuff Him. Oh, the great love of God! So many very bright people over the centuries have gone to Christless graves because of false concepts of God! If we would give ourselves the chance to explore the picture given of God in the Bible, I'm convinced it would be nigh impossible to be reduced to total surrender to such overwhelming grace.

One of my favorite songs of all time is "The Love of God." Frederick Lehman wrote the first couple of stanzas on a scrap piece of paper while seating on an empty lemon box against a wall one day in 1917. His daughter later put it to music. Look up the words on Internet. The rapturous stanza is number three, written in 1050, yes, almost a thousand years ago, by Rabbi Meir Ben Isaac Mehorai, a cantor in Worms, Germany. Lehman found the words penciled on the room wall of an insane asylum, after the patient had been carried to his grave.

You've got to digest these words:

Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above, would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky.

The love of God, how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forever more endure
The saints' and angels' song.

Yes! This is what it's all about! To share the lavish love of a God who does not ever quit giving us more and more of Him. This is what I pray we may do every night we have the privilege to open the Bible for people longing for something to snap in place in their lives.

So, here is the list to pray for this week:

1. The Manual. I'm a third of the way through a fairly detailed manual that will go to every church involved with the NET. The deadline is upon us.

2. The Implementation DVD. We've encountered major setbacks in the taping and production of this 4-hr DVD which is also to go to the churches. We've been set us back a whole month. Please pray we may find an outlet that can help us get this taped (again!) and produced quickly (and not expensively)

3.  The Churches. As of yesterday, 262 churches had signed up to be part of NET 11. Praise the Lord! However, some who wish to do so have already allocated moneys for other things. The same thing with conference evangelism budgets. Pray the Lord will help people find a way to invest in evangelism for the sake of the lost in their communities.

According to Paul (see text below), love is seven things, and it's not eight. May you know God's love more and more every day, and may His love spill over to others with abandon.

"Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag, and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things. Love never fails."

1 Corinthians 13:4-8