A friend of mine once told me, “The greatest gift you can give a lover is more love.”
I have always been able to intellectually assent to that statement. It does make sense. But only recently have I been able to echo that with any degree of certainty.
In the short time I’ve had here with my family in Texas, I have felt a marked difference in my spirit. It seems impossible to describe, but it is as if I don’t feel complete. I feel off-kilter and dry. It has nothing to do with my physical body. No, it has everything to do with my spirit.
I woke up Sunday morning as my brother’s house in Austin. I showered. I shaved. I helped my younger brother bake breakfast pastries. Yet, nothing felt quite right. I was thinking about all the things we had scheduled that day and nothing seemed appealing. Pondering that oddity for a moment, I realized that it has been too long since my heart was last connected with my Savior and Friend.
That single fact had caused such a want in me that nothing else seemed desirable. For the first time in my life, I could say with certainty that I was pained for lack His presence in my life. As odd as it seems, that pain was actually a gift.
A year ago, I had came home after my first semester at IHOPU with all the zeal of a pre-pubescent boy with a fist full of firecrackers. The possibilities seemed endless and I was ready to blast anyone who I felt didn’t live up to my standards of godliness. Thank God nobody gave me a match.
A month later, I suffered one of the most crushing blows I’ve ever weathered. My mother, with whom I often found myself at odds, had suddenly passed away. There were so many arguments and callous words that I would never be able to make right. Under all that grief and self-loathing, my heart shut down and so began the driest season of my life. I have never found myself so close to utter stoicism in my life.
Imagine my surprise when I woke up and found myself desperate for Him again. Could this pain actually be a gift? Take my word for it, when you’ve felt nothing move your heart in months, pain is not only a gift. It is a welcome relief, because it is evidence that you’re not one of the walking dead after all. Yet, in this case, it was also evidence of something else. It showed me that I really do love Jesus Christ and long for His return. Without Him, nothing else is desirable or enjoyable.
The ache was sign of something else going on deep within my heart. The ache was a sign of a deep, deep love. But here’s the warning: the greater the love, the greater the ache.
The greatest gift you can give a lover is more love. I may add one caveat. Any lover will ache for the presence of their beloved, but that ache is a welcomed pain. For the more lovesick you are, the more you love that person.
Sustain me with cakes of raisins,
Refresh me with apples,
For I am lovesick.
–SoS 2:5
