By Love Alone We Live!

I get cranky when I hear or read long, complicated definitions and descriptions of God. Something so beautiful and so simple should not be complicated.
by Charlie Leck

One of my daughters, because of pressure from some family members, I think, attends church quite regularly with her husband and two children. She struggles through some of the sermons and much of the litergy – for a couple of reasons: (1) she has the analytic and critical mind of one who teaches creative writing, which she does; and (2) she finds a lot of religion to be a bit of the hocus-pocus variety and lacking substance. When we are together, we talk occasionally about whether one can formulate a concept of God for oneself – a concept with which one could be satsfied. I think, over the years, we've gotten to that place by using the definition offered by the writer of the Epistles of John in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. That is, “God is Love!” Or, more precisely, as the epistle itself puts it….

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God; for God is love.”

And, further on in the same letter, John continues…

“No man has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.”

Often, in her church, my daughter will try to hear the minister saying this to his congregation. Instead, she mostly hears the clutter that comes from centuries of struggle within the church to come to grips with the bulk of scripture versus this little bit of brilliant information from the letters of John. I chuckle when my daughter tells me that she often listens to these Lutheran sermons and substitutes in her own mind the word “love” for dangling, mangling ,wangling descriptions of God by the pastor.

It is too bad that thinkers within the church over centuries and centuries have made so complex what John makes so simple. Few churches talk with the brilliant minimalism of John. The church I go to happens to be one of those exceptions and my wife and I both came away from services yesterday shaking our heads in wonder about how a sermon could be both brilliant and simple – and, by the way, beautiful.

During the service yesterday, the congregation sang a lovely and short hymn, By Love Alone We Live (2012). The music is by Stephen Paulus and the lyrics are by Michael Dennis Browne. The lyrics thrilled me (as did the music):

By love, by love alone we live,
     By love alone.
Whoever has love is in God
     And God is in every heart.
All to be held, all found.
     By love alone.

By love, by love alone we live,
     By love alone.
Now bless, now redeem, now heal,
     These are the leaves of the Kingdom.
All to be saved, all changed.
     By love alone.

By love, by love alone we live,
     By love alone.
Spirit remembering light,
     Out of death we pass into life.
All to be told, all known
     By love alone, by love.

By love alone, by love! Amen

_________________________

Why not become a follower?
If you read my blog regularly, why not become a follower? All you have to do is click in the upper right hand corner and establish a simple means of communication. Then you'll be informed every time a new blog is posted here. If all that's confusing, here's Google's explanation of how to do it! If you don’t want to post comments on the blog, but would like to communicate with me about it, send me an email if you’d like.

WHAT I LEARNED IN CHESTER

The lovely, kind old ladies of my childhood church took hold of my life and shook some sense into it!
by Charlie Leck

CHESTER, NEW JERSEY
A Scrapbook of History
by
Frances Greenidge

I frequently write here, on this blog, about my growing up years in Chester, New Jersey. It provides me a break from the constant ranting and raving I do about politics and government in the United States.

In order to write with some accuracy, I pull down some small works of history about this little town in the East. In them I find plenty of interesting references and even photographs of myself and other members of my family.

Very recently I was looking at this historical scrapbook collection by Frances Greenidge. I happened to notice an inscription on the front inside cover and I took the time to read it carefully.

This is the property
of
H. Evelyn Beiser
and
is to be passed on to“my Sunday School student of yesteryear”
Charles H. Leck
with
God’s blessing
and
my love.

I hope you will enjoy reading
about the
Chester
that had much to do with
making you the man you are today.
Evelyn

Indeed, Mrs. Beiser, that little town in New Jersey did have much to do with making me the man I am – nothing to particularly boast about, but nothing to be ashamed of either. And you, dear woman, were among the best teachers I ever had – Sunday or no – and I learned, perhaps, the most important thing in the world from you in that little space, under the balcony in the church, where we met as a Sunday School class. You introduced me to God and taught me the most important thing I would ever need to know about the nature of God; and, perhaps too, the most important thing I would ever need to know about life.

“God,” you said one Sunday morning, “is love.”

Then you read slowly and clearly to me and the other students in your class, from the Epistle of John, some of the most important words I would ever hear in my life. Upon hearing these words I knew that I had mastered the subject of theology and need go no further in those studies. I knew immediately what it meant to be a Christian. You gave me the most vital information I have ever been given in my entire life and I will go to my resting place being forever grateful to you for this lesson.

“God is love; and he who abides in love, abides in God. He who does not know love does not know God; for God is love!”

Yes, I learned a lot back there in that little town of Chester, but I learned it because the town was literally filled with people like you – wise saints of God who will dwell with Him forevermore. I am grateful.