Independence vs. Isolation

Preface:

As I was walking downtown today, I saw a lot more people than I expected. People were talking and mingling and well...chillin. That is the only way to put it. I went and sat down on a swing at Falls Park to do my quiet time. There were people everywhere doing everything from playing with dogs, painting, to reuniting with old friends. But I had my purpose at falls park today so I put my iPod in and went off into Mortonville. I was reading a book called "Soul Cravings" by Erwin McManus. Interesting book. This is by far the hardest book I have ever read from a "dealing with reality" standpoint. McManus in his first entry makes this statement about love: "How is it that the same thing that can make your life a rhapsody can also leave you gutted, like a dead fish wrapped in day-old newspaper." (He is speaking about any kind of love I believe not just between two people, or just between you and God.) I wanted to put the book down and not read another word.

Why is even Agape (God's Love) such a hard thing to deal with? It is so simple yet so complex. I believe it is because this kind of love is one that gives life, and life is well complex. The giver of life is much more complex. He is something that the greatest Christian minds like Luther and Calvin could not wrap their minds around. Luther struggled with how to appropriately fear God, but taught the church that God is one who desires salvation through all men, through faith. Calvin (more or less his followers) tried to reduce God to an acrostic (T.U.L.I.P.) but at the same time tried to explain to everyone that God's love is good for salvation once and for all. There has always been this struggle because some of humanity realized along the way this fact:

Love = Life.

"To give up on love is to choose a life that is less than human. To give up on love is to up on life.", Erwin McManus

Who is the author of love? Jesus Christ/Holy Spirit/Father God. So I guess to say "Giving up on God is giving up on Life" and the other way around.

Independence vs. Isolation.

One of the most dangerous questions in all of humanity is " I wonder if anyone..." McManus addresses this in his book but specifically addresses "I wonder if anyone cares?" Why is this question so dangerous? because when asked in isolation or by yourself with no one else's say so, the answer is a resounding NO! It is dangerous to think alone. Thinking alone gets people in trouble. When you answer NO to the previous question you are leaving yourself wide open for attacks from Satan. Isolation is not good. This is why Jesus grants us the church body. This is why he created it. He wants us to have loving fellowship with each other.

Often times people confuse Independence with Isolation. I am a very independent person. I do stuff on my own. I am an only child, I like being able to do stuff by myself. For instance like today, it was really good for me to get downtown and walk around by myself with my iPod in Falls Park. But there is still that desire that God has given me to have family relationships, friendships, to have a girlfriend, to meet new people, and to "enlarge my circle of influence" so to speak. Just because you are independent does not give you the excuse to be alone. If there is one thing that I have learned from being a music major in college, it is that you cannot be forced to be in a practice room 24/7 with no contact with anyone. Now granted I probably used that a little to much as an excuse to go hang out with the guys, or just get in the car and go downtown. But people are not people anymore if they have no contact with others. Contact with the real world is not something that is optional, it is a must have.

So what does this have to do with love? Love is an interaction or a feeling between two individuals. So for love to exist there has to be two parties (the action of love that is, we know that God is the definition or noun of love) Isolation says that no 2 parties are needed. This is wrong. Where there is no love, there is no value for life. That is scary, so being in isolation could cause someone to not have a value for life. Very much so.

Live, Laugh, and Love seems to be a much more profound statement now.