The God of Unrequited Love

In Christianity, we teach that God is love, and that He loves unconditionally. This is absolutely true, and the Bible speaks often of this. Many of us have sang "Jesus Loves Me," which we've known since we were young children. We quote John 3:16, tell others of God's love... As Christians, His love is very important to us. It is unconditional, everlasting, unchanging, unfailing... there are not enough adjectives to describe God's love. But, there's one facet of His love that we seem to ignore. Which one? Unrequited love.

The definition of unrequited, according to Merriam Webster, is not reciprocated or returned in kind; not requited. Looking at simple English etymology, the prefix "un-" means the opposite of, or not. To requite is simply to return or retaliate.

Now, I know that unrequited love is not a nice topic. It's painful, and brings back memories of when we ourselves loved unrequitedly. It is a hard subject. And, I think that, because of the weight of our own memories, we tend to not pay attention to this part of God's love. We don't want to think that God loves us unrequitedly, because then we must face the fact that we have turned God away and hurt Him countless times simply because we have not received His love. Think about it for a moment. There are around 6 billion people in this world, and God loves all of them. How many people, do you think, do not return His love? How many people chase after gods who are not real? How many people simply shun God? We may love many people in our lives, and we may even love some with a God-like love. Imagine someone that you love unconditionally, say, your husband, if you're married. If you found that they had been robbing banks, you would forgive and still love them. Your love wouldn't fade, no matter what they did. That's unconditional love. Now, imagine that person suddenly leaving you. You know how you would feel; I don't need to spell it out for you. This person is gone, and you still love them. That is unrequited love. Now, imagine if you loved 6+ billion people unconditionally, and many of them didn't feel the same way about you. How would you feel? It's the same with God. But, I believe it is on a larger scale, because He is the way for all to be saved.

Imagine you're a doctor, and you've just found the cure for cancer. You walk up to your patient, who is on the brink of death, and tell them, "I've found a cure for your cancer! Let's start as soon as possible so you can be well soon!" They reply, "No! Don't cure me! I'm perfectly happy as I am now. Why would I want to change? Don't come near me!" How would you feel? Now, let's step it up a notch. Again, you're the doctor, but this person is someone that you love unconditionally. The same scene plays out. How would you feel now? Bingo. God loves us all unconditionally, and he has the way for us to be saved. If God was that doctor, and we the patient, how would that conversation take place? We would want that cure, wouldn't we? You would think so. There are 6+ billion people in the world today; think of how many people do not follow the true path of salvation. Now, this can be because they don't know what is true; they could be deceived. But, there are also many people who simply refuse God because they want to. God loves them unconditionally, but also unrequitedly.

A few days ago, I was thinking about Christ and his unconditional love, and that is when I realized that God loved unrequitedly also, not just unconditionally. I believe that unrequited love is one of the strongest types of unconditional love. It is easy to love someone who openly loves you back. But to love someone who does not return that love? It is one of the most difficult things to endure. And, God endures that every single day from countless people.

We know of unrequited love. It is spoken of in music, poetry, films, books... everywhere you look, there it is. But, if we stopped for a moment, and thought of how God loves unrequitedly, not just unconditionally... think of how many people hurt Him, day after day, and yet His love for them never dies... our lives as Christians would change drastically. God is reaching out to all of us, wanting to love us. Will we let him?

Fasting: the Subject of the Day

Every year, during the month of January, my family completes a fast. I have always been taught that fasting is a good thing for us to do, and I agree wholeheartedly. It is beneficial to our mind, our spirit, and sometimes even our body. It brings us closer to God, helps us hone our self-control, and helps us keep our flesh in check, allowing our spirit to grow.

Let's look at a story in the Bible. In Mark 9:17-29, a man brings his possessed son to Jesus, and this is what takes place:


And one of the multitude answered and said, Master, I have brought unto thee my son, which hath a dumb spirit; And wheresoever he taketh him, he teareth him: and he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and pineth away: and I spake to thy disciples that they should cast him out; and they could not. He answereth him, and saith, O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him unto me. And they brought him unto him: and when he saw him, straightway the spirit tare him; and he fell on the ground, and wallowed foaming. And he asked his father, How long is it ago since this came unto him? And he said, Of a child. And ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him: but if thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us. Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief. When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him. And the spirit cried, and rent him sore, and came out of him: and he was as one dead; insomuch that many said, He is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand, and lifted him up; and he arose. And when he was come into the house, his disciples asked him privately, Why could not we cast him out? And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting. 

Notice the last verse. This man had brought his son first to the disciples, but they could not cast the spirit out. Then, they take the boy to Jesus, and in one sentence, just one, the spirit is gone. Obviously, because Jesus is God incarnate, he could have easily just looked at the spirit and uttered a silent command, or maybe just waved His hand, and it would have scampered away so quickly that it would have tripped over itself multiple times. Why did he speak? To teach the disciples a lesson. And, thankfully, they realized that they were missing something. They went to Jesus and asked Him, "Why could not we cast him out?" to which he replied, "This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting." Pretty interesting, huh? Here's the same story, but told by Matthew (Matthew 17:14-21):


And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying, Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me. And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting. 

And in Luke 9:37-42:

And it came to pass, that on the next day, when they were come down from the hill, much people met him. And, behold, a man of the company cried out, saying, Master, I beseech thee, look upon my son: for he is mine only child. And, lo, a spirit taketh him, and he suddenly crieth out; and it teareth him that he foameth again, and bruising him hardly departeth from him. And I besought thy disciples to cast him out; and they could not. And Jesus answering said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you, and suffer you? Bring thy son hither. And as he was yet a coming, the devil threw him down, and tare him. And Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, and healed the child, and delivered him again to his father. 

(One thing to remember about the different versions is that, they were written by three separate men with three varying viewpoints. And each man wrote with a different purpose in mind. Because of this, sometimes the details are slightly varied, but all of the stories are still correct.)

One interesting thing to note is that fasting, in the Bible, when speaking of spiritual things, is always coupled with prayer. We'll talk about this later on. In this story, it appears that they were also having some issues with lack of faith and unbelief (which some could argue as being the same thing). Jesus did touch on this with them, and, from Matthew 17:20, we find the famous "faith as a mustard seed" Scripture. But He also left them a clue. "Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." (Matthew) "This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting." (Mark) In law, they teach that during a trial, one must have 2 or more agreeing witnesses for something to be true. In that case, there's your proof.

But, you might say, "Hey, wait! They didn't fast while Jesus was with them." That's true. In Luke 5:33-35, Jesus explains why, and later in the chapter even gives a parable concerning it.

"And they said unto him, Why do the disciples of John fast often, and make prayers, and likewise the disciples of the Pharisees; but thine eat and drink? And he said unto them, Can ye make the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them, and then shall they fast in those days."

Jesus, the bridegroom, was with them. Let's look at it this way, when you're at a wedding, do you wear all black to the wedding? Do you skip bringing a present? Do you forbid yourself to eat cake? Do you avoid laughing, smiling, congratulating, and enjoying the day with the new couple? Of course not! Weddings are meant to be a celebration of a new life, a time of fun, love, and laughter. You wouldn't want to be mopey during such a great moment, would you? Exactly. And this is why they didn't fast. (This story also appears in Matthew 9:14-15 and Mark 2:19-20.)

Fasting is a hard thing. One must sacrifice their flesh and must submit themselves. And, the only part of us that enjoys that is our spirit. Let's face it. No one likes going without food, staying with a certain type of diet (Daniel's fast), avoiding their favorite video game, staying away from media, or any other type of thing that you may fast. It's not fun, because your flesh wants to do those things, but you are choosing to not do so. Because Jesus was with them, it was a time of celebration. I mean, seriously, if you were hanging out with God incarnate, would you want to be mopey? No way! I'd be having the time of my life! "Hey, Jesus, I'll race you to the top of this mountain. Oh, look! You're already there." "Hey, want to play Scrabble?" "Hey, want to have a juggling competition?" "Can you tell me in chronological order the events of Earth's history?" "How exactly did you come up with light?" "How did you confuse the languages at the Tower of Babel?" "How do our speech processors work?" "How exactly do the  signal-carrying electrical currents travel throughout the body?" "How does my brain tell my legs to move?" "Why do I not like oranges, but love orange juice?" "Hey, let's have a party! I'll introduce you to all my friends!" If God incarnate was sitting in your living room, what would you do?

Earlier, I spoke of a clue. My belief is that Jesus was giving them direction for their coming ministries. Because it is true: if you wish to further your ministry into the unknown, you must first fast and pray. You can't receive this kind of growth through other's relationship with God (Acts 19:13-16). Let's look at it this way. Say you're trying to lose weight. If your friend goes for a run, and you just sit on the couch, will you lose any weight? No! Why not? Your friend was exercising! Because you did not do the work. Fast forward a few months... the process is the same. Every day your friend goes for a run, and you just sit on the couch. Who will lose the weight? The Friend will. It is the same application. You do not see progress in yourself unless you do the work.

Jesus was saying, Hey, you're going to need this tool after my ascension. You'll need to call upon My Name for these things to happen, and when that happens, you'll need to be prepared. He knew that those men were going to shake the world to its very core. He had planned it all, and now He was preparing them. 

Why is it important that you couple prayer and fasting? I can answer this in one word: temptation. In Matthew 26:41, it reads, "Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." Now, just so you're aware, this verse has nothing to do with fasting. In fact, this verse comes from when Jesus was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane before His crucifixion. The disciples had fallen asleep, and Jesus was warning them of the vulnerability of the flesh towards temptation. Although this verse is not related to fasting at all, the concept is the same. When one fasts, they are putting their flesh into submission. They sacrifice their fleshly desires. Because of this sacrifice, our fleshly selves are not pleased at all. They don't like it, nor do they enjoy it one bit. Which means that when temptation comes along, it comes with great strength, and our flesh wishes to indulge in that temptation. This is why prayer is coupled with fasting. To fast without prayer is to have a lopsided table. If you place something on the table, it will fall off and crash onto the floor. But, if you fast and pray, your table is level, and the strength combined is enough to hold up what is placed onto the table. You become stronger spiritually, and are more able to fight these temptations.

Fasting is not a bad thing at all. Even Jesus fasted (Matthew 4:1-11). Fasting only becomes bad for you if you either 1) do it for the wrong reasons, or 2) do it ignorantly. The average person can go without food for 40 days. Some people can't go without food for very long periods because of the way their body is made, and some people can't do it at all due to health reasons. That's ok. Fasting is not only abstinence from food. True fasting is in your motives; it is only true fasting when you purpose to put God first. You look at your priorities and what you do most, and if those priorities have nothing to do with God, then you purpose to change what you are doing, and sometimes cut it out completely for a time. This even counts with food, because it is quite often that food can become such a great temptation. Fasting is simply the practice of self-control and sacrifice of the flesh, which results in God being first in your life. As an example, for 30 days I did Daniel's fast where I did not eat meat, dairy, eggs, or sweets. I also fasted videos, a particular video game, and for two weeks I fasted Facebook & Pinterest. Please understand that I am not bragging. Any effort to fast is a great thing, no matter how great or how small. I'm showing you that it's not always necessary to fast food. It's often preferred because you must really control flesh more so than if you weren't watching movies or playing a video game. But it's also important to look at the other things in your life. I had been spending too much time on my video game, movies, Facebook, and Pinterest. Because of this, I chose to abstain from those things; I needed to refocus. My parents and I decided to do Daniel's fast because we would have unified fasting in our home, which is good when you are a team of ministry.

Moving on, fasting is very good and beneficial. If you are trying to fast food but have medications that you need to take food with, I'm sure God will understand if you have to eat a piece of bread with your medicine. Sometimes, we have to make exceptions because of health reasons. But, if we are healthy, there is no reason for us to have exceptions. Everyone in the church is on different levels of spiritual understanding. One cannot expect a new convert to suddenly go with no food for 40 days. They must grow to the point where they can achieve it. To be honest, I've never fasted food completely before, and last month was the first time I had done Daniel's fast for 30 days. This doesn't make me any less of a Christian. I have simply not felt that I was ready spiritually for a no-food fast, and doing Daniel's fast for 30 days was an accomplishment in itself for me. It is a process for everyone. The more you grow, the more you can do. It's like a child... they must crawl before they walk, sit before they stand, and speak jibberish before they talk. I freely admit that I'm still growing, and that I'm far from finished. But, I do my best to grow, and in the future, I will complete a no-food fast. It's a personal goal.

As followers of Christ, we must continuously align our priorities correctly, sacrifice our flesh, strengthen our spirit, and strive to move closer to God. As a result, we do become closer with Him, we learn more about Who He is, and He, in turn, furthers our ministries. And fasting is a successful method to accomplish this. I think that I would rather place my flesh in check, if it meant that I could help someone come to the place where they can receive God's Spirit. That's a fair trade, don't you think?

Have a lovely day!

Motley & Company

My friend, Alyssa, is opening an Etsy.com store! While this sort of thing isn't something I would normally blog about, my friend is special. And her reason for having this online store is special as well.

Alyssa has worked very hard for the past 3+ years to help supply money for UPCI global missionaries to have automobiles. All of the money which she has raised goes to a project called "Sheaves For Christ." You can read about it here. I don't even know all of the tactics that she's used, but I know she's made so many scarves and done everything that she could to make her goal. She has done so well, and raised so much money, that she has won the "Real McCoy" contest held by the UPCI General Youth Division multiple times. You can read about it here. This gal is special, and she has done so much to help us missionaries while we're out here on the field.

Why am I writing about this? I am so glad that you asked! Alyssa's Etsy.com store, Motley & Company, is going to be her venue for raising these funds for missionaries. She's going to have bags, purses, scarves... so many amazing and stylish handmade items for a great price. The profits will go towards "Sheaves for Christ" to help us missionaries. God has blessed her efforts, and I know that if you'll help out, He'll bless yours, too. Her shop opens on February 1st, 2013. So, please, stop by the store on opening day! And, if you could help Alyssa out by telling your friends and family about it, it would be such an amazing thing!
Motley & Company's Facebook

Thank you so much, and have a lovely day!

Happy new year! - Purposeful planning for 2013

Happy new year, everyone! Looking back over the last year, it was a good year. It was a very hard year, and I learned a lot of lessons. But in retrospect, it was still a good year, and I'm better for having lived through it.

I regret, however, that I didn't blog near as much as I would have liked. But, I normally only do it when I have a very strong inspiration. I will still be writing as such, but I also am going to develop a plan for some topics that I will be writing about. Many of them stem from my recent lessons in life.

Believe me when I say I don't have all the answers. I'm recently 18, single, and ready to push on and climb the mountain of adulthood. My new years resolutions include becoming fit, getting my ministerial license with the Nordic region of the UPCI, learning to drive, becoming an AIM, getting into University, and finding a job. Some of these I can complete pretty easily, but others, not so much. Getting a driving license here requires a bit of money, getting into university is difficult, and I need to read quite a few books, teach some Bible studies, and sit in a room full of people and be interrogated to get my ministerial license. Well, not really, but I'm told that they ask very difficult questions. So, these are my challenges, and I am completely confident that I will complete them.

Since I am currently in the mode of purposeful planning for the next year, I decided that it would be a good idea to make some plans about blogging. I had a recent conversation with a friend and we talked of some topics of which I should write. Keep your eyes open for when they show up, and we'll have a lovely ride. And if you'd like me to write about a topic, feel free to ask. I can't guarantee I'll write about it, but I just might. So, without further or do, the topics chosen so far are:

• Perspective
• What Christ is to you
• Positivity vs. Negativity
• Growth/moving forward
• Soulwinning

This is my year of purpose. I am preparing myself for the responsibilites that face me as an adult, as a grown woman, as a worker, as a one-day future wife, as a Christian, and as a minister. When my parents leave for the States to raise money for the work here, I will stay behind and work with our group, not only to maintain, but also to expand. Here I will create my home, and if God tells me to leave Finland, or I get married to someone from another country, only then I will leave. If not, here I will stay. Finland presents many challenges to me, and I look forward to facing them with God's help.

What are your resolutions? Will this be a year of purposeful planning for you, too?

Have a lovely day!