I remember one of the last shifts I worked in the little trauma step-down unit about 10 months ago. Patients there were still critical but did not require the intensive nursing care that the ICU demanded. Nevertheless, I’ve seen a number of patients deteriorate and die in that unit.
After my usual cruising into the department, finding a funny patient to joke around with and figuring out what needed to be done, I worked my way down to bed #9 which was a bit more private than the rest (it actually had a door). As I spoke with the nurse she explained what had happened to this young man—he had a tracheotomy so he couldn’t speak, and was recovering from major head and abdominal trauma following a serious car crash. He had been in the hospital for a few months now and was showing tremendous signs of improvement against all odds. As the nurse continue to give me the report on his condition, an incredibly attractive woman entered and entered the man’s room. The nurse said to me in hushed tones, “that’s his fiancé, she’s the reason he’s doing so well.” Intrigued by this statement, I stuck around a bit at the end of the unit. The nurse went on to describe the intensity at which she would visit: every day for the entire length of visiting hours…and sometimes the nurses would let her stay much longer because she was so helpful.
I was stocking supplies later on in the day and I saw her sitting on the side of his bed peacefully singing to him. I asked myself, “how do you do that? He can’t even talk to you—he hasn’t for months. Do you even know if he remembers you? He has a frontal lobe injury and his personality has changed, does that matter to you?”
Apparently not; for love does not consider those superficial characteristics.
What about the love shown to you by an infinite God?
Was it based on how you would react to God’s love?
Was it based on your choice of words?
Was it based on the emotion that you welled up inside yourself when you came to Him asking for forgiveness?
Was God thinking “oh, he must be truly sorry so I’ll love him!”?
No, it can’t be any of these, for it would debase God’s love to a level lower than this fiancé’s love for my patient. God’s love is so much higher and wiser than even the best expressions of love that we can construe. He loves us while we were “dead in our trespasses and sins”—he loves us when we can do nothing.
We think we know what love is all about, but we see it most clearly and for what it truly means when crisis arises.
It’s not some erotomania, it’s a God who comes to us as a human, He shows us the holes in his hands and feet and calls us to place our hands in his side. It’s not “I love you so I’ll give you a great feeling to live your life by.” Instead, He says, “Greater love has no man than this than that he lays down his life for his friends.” And He goes and submits an infinitely worthy life to the cross so that sinners like you and me can become the children of God. Our God is not all talk; he goes and does as much as it takes to know and love His own.
We love because he first loved us.
True Love Phil Wickham
Come close listen to the story
about a love more faithful than the morning
The Father gave his only Son just to save us
The earth was shaking in the dark
All creation felt the Fathers broken heart
tears were filling heavens eyes
The day that true love died, the day that true love died
When blood and water hit the ground
Walls we couldn’t move came crashing down
We were free and made alive
The day that true love died, The day that true love died
Search your hearts you know you can’t deny it
Lose your life just so you can find it
The Father gave his only son just to save us
Jesus is alive
He rose again
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