A thought—“If you are a lover, then you must be a fighter.”
I supposed my thought was original…until I Googled it.
It’s not. Somebody already said it.
Who? I don’t know. I didn't open the link.
Just know that I’m not the genius you thought I was when you read that first sentence.
But, I’d like to take a moment and linger over my unoriginal thought, if you don’t mind.
“If you are a lover, then you must be a fighter.” It goes contrary to the cliché, “Be a lover, not a fighter.” But I think it makes more sense than the latter.
What is the nature of true love? To do something for another that secures their well-being no matter the injury or loss of one’s own well-being, all without expectation of remuneration, or gratitude.
(Mental picture: Leonardo Di Caprio – floating door – Rose - Arctic Ocean – sinking boat - brrrr.)
If this is to be our definition, then perhaps each of us can name something that we love like this.
When I think of love, I immediately think of my children. I have a love for them that caused me to delete this sentence seven times, because I couldn’t find the right words to describe it adequately. For most parents, it would go without saying that, if given the option, we would go to the grave before our children were harmed. It doesn’t matter whether we are peace makers or war mongers, whether we would pick up a piece of legislation, picket sign, telephone, or a weapon; we’d fight to secure their well-being.
True love fights.
It’s because we can’t truly love something and yet stand by passively when it is threatened. It’s impossible. Even if our only action is kneeling down to pray or giving advice or abstaining from caffeine for our unborn baby, we enter the battle field when we fall in love. There is always something that will move us to defensive action.
So, aren’t I supposed to be a Christian? What happened to that whole, “turn the other cheek” thing?
It’s all in the definition of “fight,” I think. I, at my core, believe Jesus Christ was a fighter.
If you are a believer in Jesus the Christ, rather than just Jesus the man, then you believe that his presence on earth had a purpose. And that purpose was to set free every person enslaved by the condition of a sinful world. And so his purpose began with the intent to fight…for us. And he did. He would cause angst everywhere he went, he would throw people into hysterics with his radical worldview, and he would throw down evil with just a word. His love was too great to be passive.
Awesome, I know.
So, let me turn the tables on you a moment.
Tell me again, what do you love? If you’re a Christ follower, allow me to ask if you love him?
Would you fight for him?
The inspiration for this blog was an article titled, “80 Executed in North Korea.” Some of those 80 were people who were convicted of the crime of carrying their Bible. I read elsewhere that some were imprisoned when found in their homes worshiping.
I carried these people around in my heart, and the idea that they too were fighters began to settle on me. They didn’t pick up any weapons, they didn’t strike anyone, but they would not stand passively by while their Gospel, their Christ was threatened. They worshiped. They studied. They prayed. And all of it, all of it, was radical. Just like Jesus.
Perhaps, my definition of “fighting” is just that: the radical acts done by those who will not passively stand by when the well-being of who/what they love is threatened. It sounds a lot like my definition of love. Can they be separated?
I don’t think so.