Chapter 25 Try and Love One Another Right Now

Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try and love one another right now.

The Youngbloods




It really isn't necessary for you to dig out any of those flower-power songs from the sixties. Just look around you. What's old is new again.

Love is making a comeback.

You gotta admit, though -- in Christendom, we had a pretty good run without it.

We ignored it.

We hushed it away.

We put conditions upon it or saved it for special occasions.

We released it in small portions when the timing was right (and when others were looking).

When they weren't, we gave love a back seat during our debate and our discourse.

We sent it off to foreign lands.

Ultimately, we buried it.

But love would not be denied. In fact, never designed to play second fiddle, it was marking its return while we were still underestimating it, assuming it to be some fickle and quirky emotion.

Not even close.

You see, if we take the Word at his word, then it's pretty clear that Love itself hovered over the waters even before the world began. The Word, being marked by Love, was with God, and through the Word, all things were made. In the very beginning, Love was present.

Love was the grand Designer of it all.

And true to form, at just the right time, the Word became Jesus, at Christmastime to be exact; a cosmic shrinking of an all powerful Creator into a mere human: a carpenter (so he could still make things with his hands). He was a man, but only because he allowed himself to be; not on some whim, some lost bet, but because he knew he must overcome all challengers. Love needed a comeback and so he delivered himself; for someone such as me, and someone such as you. For humanity as a whole.

The Word, because of Love, got out.

It makes no sense, but who could make this up? There he was, Love come down, walking this earth, a supreme Power in everyday skin, knowing full well that the sand between his toes, the stones of the Temple, the fig upon the tree, the beak of the bird, the sun, moon and stars, all came into being because of him.

And through him.

We know he was here -- the history books tell us that. But we also know that history repeats itself, because back then, too, they did their best to push Love down.

They hushed him away.

They put conditions upon him (they had also enjoyed a good run without him).

Then, they buried him.

Yet, here’s the thing about Love: because of him, the forces of hate never had a chance. Death had finally met its match.

But it wasn't easy. This was not a light-at-the-end-of the-tunnel return from death where a man lay helpless on a hospital table and for a minute or even an hour he teeters between waking and sleeping until a doctor shocks him back into reality with enough memory intact to weave his tale of the afterlife.

No, this man beat death after being beaten himself, this very Love pierced and brutalized into submission. No one took out the paddles, nurses sourrounding, waiting for a charge that would save his life. He was deserted in a tomb to go the path of all other bodies before him.

He was ignored and sent away, and for three days he fought the battle on his own.

But you know what? Love won. He brought himself back to life. He delivered his comeback and he lives; then, now, and evermore.

Love will not be denied.

Well of course! This all makes sense because Love created and still sustains all life in its own image. Love persevered, and once again, it's making a comeback.

We were designed to love. What's old is new again.

So, come on people now, smile on your brother, everybody get together ..

Sing it with me:

Try and love one another right now.