The Threat of Love
Love is usually a term of
endurement and sublimity. It is also a threat
to an individual.
Take an example. A young man
dates a pretty girl. In the course of
friendship he enjoys her company, is fascinated by her presence, and
grows to love her. Perhaps she does not at this point share his
feelings.
As the young man speaks of
his love she is probably flattered; but as
he continues to talk of marriage, there are certain threats
to her existence implied in his speech.
His proposal is a threat to
her form of existence. The young man wants
to change her state of freedom. Presently, she is free to go and do
what she will. His love wants to build a hedge around this. The young
man's love is a threat to her responses. At present she is free to cast
about to bestow her affection on whom she will.
Threat to Future
His love is also a threat to
what she might want to do in life. Love on
the part of the young man implies the threat of a family, of children,
of the tedious humdrum duties of a household, and of the limits of
monogamy.
Until the young girl comes
to the same response of love to the young
man, all of these thing are a threat to her individual happiness. As
she responds--which is always done with a risk and the possibility
of unhappiness-- she will come to see that love poses not only a threat
but also as a means of fulfilment.
Her response of love will
bring happiness that she could not know
alone. As she responds she does not sorrow at the threat of fences
around her affection only to him. In the fulfillment of love and
companionship, children become a delight. Love, with loyalty, now
becomes the foundation stone of monogamy. The response of love and
commitment dissolves the threat and becomes the means of personal
fulfillment.
The same is experienced in
the divinehuman encounter. God comes
in love to man. Unlike the yourig man who dates a girl; man does not
have the initial open friendship of God. Only later is one
able to look back and see that one really did have the
divine presence surrounding one's life.
God's Love to Man
But God does come, and
He speaks of His love to man. Man's first
response is not always love at first sight. God's word of
love seems a threat to his existence. God's love seeks a response
that undermines man's personal existence far more deeply than marriage.
Marriage does not change the interior nature. of the person. God's love
comes demanding the right to change man into a different creation.
God's love seems
a threat to one's freedom. Man is asked to give up his
willfulness and submit to the rule of God's love. No longer can he go
where he wants to and follow his own desires. God's love seems a threat
to man's affections. God demands loyalty first He does not allow for
competing loyalties.
This threat seems so great
that many feel the cost of responding is too
great. However, as with' the young man and girl, the threat may be
resolved. In the encounter with God and the response of love to Him, it
becomes possible to see that this is the kind of person one really
wanted to be but could not be alone.
True Freedom
At the same time, the threat of
losing freedom is wiped out In the
response of love one discovers true freedom. The old freedom was a
slavery that was never known for what it really was.
The effect upon man's
affections and loyalty likewise is solved. When
God demands pre-eminence in all things it is for the purpose of
benefiting man whom He loves. God cannot really help man until man
ceases placing the emphasis upon himself. Love is a threat to
superficiality, self-centeredness, and pride. But who needs these?
Dallas M. Roark is associate professor of philosophy and religion
at Kansas State Teachers College.
This appeared in the Baptist Standard of Texas July 10,
1968