Twue wuv…

A friend recently sent me an email about covenant marriages, something I wrote about a long time ago when some states began debating offering this as a legal contract within marriages. My friend said that even within states that do not offer this, churches are offering this a method of vowing that you are going to work on your marriage no matter what and make it work out.

Neal and I discussed covenant marriages when we first began talking about what we were going to do, way back in November. We read up on it, the legality of it in some states and the written promise of it in churches. We debated drawing something up that we would both sign that vowed we would work on our marriage come financial issues or chomping our food annoyingly loudly. We discussed and discussed, conversed about the pros and cons of it.

Then we realized something. We were vowing, before God, family, and each other, to be with each other forever. Until we die. Always, no matter what comes before us. This isn’t just a simple promise made *shrug, shrug*. This is a real covenant, between each other as individuals and between our one-ness with God as a marriage unit. Our big symbol for our ceremony is a trinity knot, reminding us that we are united in a bond of three, for the rest of our natural and eternal lives. We realized that our vow, our word on the day of the wedding (what we actually are calling, between ourselves, “the covenant ceremony”) means more than a piece of paper. We are calling out to God, to each other, to those present that we are going to work through everything. With God’s help and with the help of the other in the unit.

Remember when words meant something? No? Neither do I. I’ve never had the privilege to live in a time or culture where someone could say, “I give you my word,” and have it actually MEAN something to all parties, to know that the person saying it would do the thing that they were saying no matter what happened.

Neal and I watch Stargate:SG-1 together, as we both love the characters and the interesting plot lines that we come across. In a recent one (well, from the first season but recent in that we just watched it together), Jack says, “I give you my word.” To the culture he was visiting, that MEANT something. They believed him, trusted him. Unfortunately, others in our own culture undercut his words and made them mean absolutely nothing. Near the end, the other species stated, “If I do not do as I said and I have given my word, I am no better than these. I must follow my vow.”

Where is that today? When we make a literal covenant and follow through with it? When we realize that our promises should mean something? This article talks about relationships and loyalty. It discuses, in part, marriage but focuses much on literal friendships, what it means to be a true friend who follows through. I have mentioned before how much I hate the whole “fun friends” idea. I want friendships with substance. I want one that I can talk to, debate with…and the ones I can say to, “Hey, your recent actions, words, thoughts? I’m thinking you need to examine them closer and figure out that something’s not exactly right here.” I want friends who can say the same thing to me.

I’ve had friendships like that in the past. Some remain intact, true loyalty, friends attempting to make me into a better person and who ask the same of me to them, friends who know I speak my mind and want me to. Some have fallen away. I no longer can tell my true feelings to them without their blowing everything out of proportion. Those hurt. I can’t hold them accountable for actions anymore and I can’t rely on them to do the same for me.

I’m big on friendly accountability. If I’m doing something stupid, tell me about it, please. I need to know and sometimes have my eyes opened to my mistakes. I also need someone to say, “Hey, I know that you’ve been messing up. And you need to stop.” And when I go to a friend specifically requesting assistance with accountability, I want to know that they are willing to be a true friend and hold me to the highest standard. The previously linked article discusses this. Reading through it, I felt sadness at what is missing today, what I’m lacking in some friendships, what I used to have in some and no longer feel…and felt contentment that I can still count a few close, accountability-holding friends among those I love and cherish.

What does this idea of unconditional love mean, if it doesn’t mean acceptance and holding your tongue to maintain peace? I was recently shown photographs taken to convey the feelings, sense, and emotion behind 1 Corinthians 13:13: faith, hope, and love.”

Love.

There’s that word again, breaking into life and complicating things. I’ve written on love before, about saying it to one we’re physically intimate with with no thought to what it means but about not being able to say it to friends and family. To not saying it to those we should and saying it because we think we should when we shouldn’t. To mourn the deep loss of meaning behind this word.

Agape. This is the love we are called to here. Not eros, a romantic love. Not philia, a brotherly love between humankind that implies a deep friendship. Agape: Love that gives without thought for self. Love that expects nothing in return for just simply loving someone else. Love that is love intrinsically, because it just is. This is love that holds even when something is unlovable. It is given because it is.

I was a bit disconcerted with the picture I was given for love in that verse, seeing a picture depicting an romantic moment between a man and a woman. This struck a chord in me. I was deterred from seeing this as love because it was so forced, so worldly a view of love that I couldn’t even begin to see the agape behind its motive, what I was told it was supposed to be showing me. “The greatest of these is agape.” How has the greatest become so debased in our world today? So meaningless. How has love only come to mean a physical rush of desire and not a heartfelt rush of desire to help another simply because it’s needed?

Neal and I refuse to use 1 Cor. 13 in our wedding. This chapter, although many times used exclusively to detail the marriage relationship, covers ALL relationships. This should not be used to just explain the married couples relationship with each other. Rather, it should be used to describe our love of all others…without ceasing. The word in previous versions of The Bible was translated as “charity.”

Charity.

Now there’s a new spin on love. Let’s look that up in my Merriam Webster, shall we? Ah…here we go! “Charity.” From caritas or “Christian love”. (Ahhh…bringing back memories of my medieval literature classes where we had major discussions on caritas vs. cupiditas. Unconditional love of friendship vs. passionate lust. Long-term versus short-lived.) There’s background on the origin of the word itself so…let’s go directly to the definition: “benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity.”

I don’t know about your opinion but that sounds more like “unconditional love” than what we think of today when we hear the more flowery word we’re given. Charity, a word that has lost more than most of its meaning in the midst of guilt-giving and material goods. (Of course, “love” has lost much of its meaning as well, so replacing this word hasn’t done much good, eh?) Is this a man and a woman holding hands? No. That image is the flowery word, not unconditional love. This is a hand held out in supplication, wanting to help. This is the hand of an older woman reaching out to a child to guide the way. This is the hand smoothing back the hair of a tiny baby, giving comfort and love with so little able to be given back.

THIS

is love.

What have we done with this word? What have we done with loyalty? Friends don’t know our love; they don’t know the love of a person just because they are who they are, no strings. They don’t know the love of someone who wants them so badly to be what they CAN be, the best they can be, that they are willing to risk their own comfort themselves just to help the other person up and let them know they are there for them, looking out for them, wanting them to be something great.

I was recently reminded of this by a friend who was telling me of a situation that they were requesting accountability for. They went to another friend and explained the bothersome situation to them. Instead of holding this person accountable, they ignored the plea for help, ignored the obvious question to be held liable for actions performed. What kind of friend stands by and watches you delve deeper into something you hate about yourself? What kind of friend doesn’t help you, doesn’t reach out a hand to pull you out of the mud? What kind of friend lets you wallow and, more than that, gives you the silent okay to dig deeper and let you hate yourself more?

I want the kind of friend who does more. I want to be held accountable for my actions and I want someone to point out that I need to be doing better. And, when I am falling and reach out a hand for assistance, I want a friend who will reach right back and pull hard, not halfheartedly or, worse, not at all.

Wuv, twue wuv… *grins* Don’t we all want true love? Unconditional love? Love that lifts up and helps us be something better? If we are called to do this, not just for our friends but for everyone, how do we view our place in this world? And if we drop the ball on even loving our friends enough to help them, can we begin to find our place as lovers of mankind?

This article struck a chord in me. We are called to love in entirety. Not because everyone deserves it but because we are to be loving creatures. I am amazed at how little we show this even to those we consider our friends, as Anderson mentions in his piece. We are losing something and I’m afraid that we can’t regain it.

We can’t even take another at his or her word let alone assume love for all. We can’t even believe that the one person we love as ourselves and wish to be publicly united with ourselves is going to remain true to their covenant with us. We can’t even believe the couple in front of us expressing supposed truth that they will be together for all time knows what marriage is supposed to mean without realizing that half of the people we see get married don’t.

But I believe in what I have. I am grateful for my friendships and relationships with others. I am grateful that I know Neal will mean his vows and that I will not be “dumped in order that a husband may indulge in self-fulfillment”. We know that our word means something, that it will hold up. That no matter what we may legally do, under God’s terms…? We can’t break the covenant we’ve set up. I am grateful for the accountability I’ve had over the years and the acceptance of the accountability I’ve given.

I am loved. I love. Not as much as I should. Not as deeply. Not as profoundly. I need to work on that whole unconditional-even-when-unlovable thing that is required of me. Sometimes other people do unlovable things and I dislike. Sometimes I do unlovable things and I don’t even like myself.

But we are called to love. To give without getting. To lift up just to make someone else a greater person without recognition of self.

I need to work on that. Anyone willing to give some accountability?