©2003 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

02/09/03

The Divine Romance

2/9/03 The Divine Romance

I had intended to return to our study of Ephesians today,

but I’ve decided to put that off for one more week

and use our time this morning

for something altogether different.

I suppose my change of direction

was prompted at some level

by all of these hearts and cupids decorating the stores right now.

We have Valentines Day approaching this Friday,

(that’s intended to be a friendly reminder for you husbands

who have not yet tuned into what’s going on)

and this nationally recognized day,

set aside for the celebration of romance,

is sort of an excuse for me to do what I’m going to do.

But in truth,

I think the real incentive

for doing what I’m going to do

came as a result of an email I received this week

from a person who was reading The Fisherman.

In that e-mail

the person made the following comment:

“What a beautiful relationship between Peter and Jesus. It is almost like a love story.”

As soon as I read that,

I thought to myself, “That’s it! That’s it exactly.

That really is what was going on between Peter and Jesus.

And that really is what’s going on

between every one of us and our God.”

This may sound a little strange to you

to talk about our relationship with our God in these terms,

but if it does sound strange

it is only because the world of religion

has so powerfully

and so effectively blinded us to the truth.

The world of religion around us

constantly flings at us

all sorts of other messages about our God.

It tells us that it’s all about duty,

and submission,

and obedience,

and productivity,

and self-sacrifice.

It skillfully creates for us

the kind of relationship with God

in which, if we produce for Him,

He will in turn produce for us.

And in the end

it produces a pathetic mass of people

who are secretly deeply disappointed in their God,

and who are convinced that their God is deeply disappointed in them.

But when I received that e-mail

describing Peter’s relationship with Jesus as a love story,

something clicked into place in my thinking

that fits perfectly with what I have always known to be true in my spirit.

And I want us to take this morning

to talk about a romance you are involved in right now,

but a romance you have most likely never thought of in those terms,

the divine romance between us and our God.

So let me start with a statement.

If you cannot honestly describe your own history with God as a love story,

then you have not yet seen the truth of what is really going on.

We understand,

or at least we pretend we understand

this romance thing

as it applies to human relationships.

We know what it is

for one human being

to pursue another human being

with the hope of establishing a love relationship that will grow forever.

One of the many little treasures buried in the Proverbs

is found in Proverbs 30:18-19

There are three things which are too wonderful for me, Four which I do not understand: The way of an eagle in the sky, The way of a serpent on a rock, The way of a ship in the middle of the sea, And the way of a man with a maid.

And the way of a man with a maid...

We know exactly what Solomon is talking about, don’t we?

There is something utterly remarkable

that takes place within us

when we begin to pursue a love relationship with another human being.

I can tell you the instant I first saw Sandee -

I mean really saw her,

saw her as the one with whom I wanted a friendship more than anyone else,

more than everyone else.

I was walking into the old Soldotna Drug Store,

which very few of you even remember now,

and Sandee was walking up to the door at the same time.

And all of the sudden,

there she was.

And I wondered how in the world I could not have seen her before.

And from that time on

my mind found a thousand different ways

to be where I knew she would be,

to just happen to stop by the school where she was teaching,

to make sure I was at every event,

every gathering,

ever meeting where she might be.

I became the most socially motivated young man you’ve ever seen,

and for those of you who know me well,

you know what a miracle that is.

That eagle in the sky

and that serpent on the rock

couldn’t even begin to compete with my maneuvers.

Now, you see, we understand that dynamic well.

We understand what it is

for us, on a human level,

to eagerly seek to build a love relationship with another human being.

But, what we so often fail to see

is that, at the spirit level,

the same thing is going on

between our Creator and us.

There are some obvious differences, of course.

Our love responses to one another

are always, at best deeply flawed.

We frequently find our initial love responses

based on little more than another person’s physical appearance,

and what we’re really seeking

is not the person we love

but rather the person that we believe will meet our love needs.

And, beyond that,

we rarely see the other person with any degree of accuracy,

and we do everything within our power

to make certain they see only those things in us

that we are willing to risk allowing them to see.

God’s pursuit of us, on the other hand,

is based on His perfect and total knowledge of who we really are.

And He seeks us

not because He wants us so that He can meet His own love needs,

but rather simply because,

in spite of everything we’ve done in our own rebellion against Him,

He really, truly does love each of us,

apart from anything we have or haven’t done.

I find it fascinating

to see the things my Lord sometimes uses

to give me little glimpses into what’s really going on between Him and me.

Those of you who have some history with us here

know that God frequently used our miniature schnauzer, Pepper,

to help me see things I could so easily have missed.

Pepper has been in doggie heaven for a little over a year, now,

but an incident took place in his final days with us

that helped me to gain new insight

into the way my God relates to me.

Pepper’s health began to fail gradually over his final few years with us.

His hearing grew worse and worse,

his eye sight was nearly completely gone,

and even going up and down the stairs became increasingly difficult for him.

Toward the end he spent nearly all of his time

sleeping on the couch in the loft.

Normally, I would carry him outside before we went to bed

so that he could take care of business,

and once I put him back onto his blanket in the loft

he would sleep through the entire night.

But one night a few months before he was killed

I woke up to the sound of something crashing down the stairs.

I got up and stepped out of our bedroom,

turned on the light,

and found Pepper curled in a pathetic heap at the bottom of the stairs.

I went down,

picked him up,

and carried him back to his bed.

Nothing seemed to be broken,

but the fall must have been a terrible jolt to his system

because the next morning something was clearly terribly wrong.

He wouldn’t eat.

He wouldn’t drink any water.

He wouldn’t even lie down on his little blanket.

For most of that morning

I sat in the loft with my little dog.

To be honest, at the time I was certain he was dying.

About mid morning

I typed these words out on my laptop.

For the past half hour now I have been sitting with him here in the loft. I’ve moved his blanket off the couch and onto the floor. He knows it is his place, and walks over to it, sniffs it, and then sits. But he hasn’t been able to lie down. He’s shaking a little, though the house is cozy warm. I suppose he must have a temperature.

If only I could get him to lie down. He will only sit, then walk a few paces, then sit again. He walks down the hallway to the top of the stairs, but then turns again and walks back to the loft. Every once in a while he peaks under the railing, out through the living room window down below, as if there is something he needs to do - some moose to warn us about, some neighborhood dog to chase off the property, some unknown intruder to be confronted. Each time he stands and stares for a minute or two, then returns again to his blanket. But still he will not lie down.

I have brought his food up from the entry way, and his water dish in from the bathroom. He sniffs them both, but eats and drinks nothing. I wonder now how much the fall down the stairs last night has affected him.

If only I could tell him what I’m thinking. If only I could tell him there is nothing more he needs to do. There is no task unfulfilled, nothing he needs to warn us about, no intruders for him to fend off. He has already fulfilled his calling. The purpose for which his Creator sent him into this world is now complete. He was sent to love - to love a little girl in pig tails, who very much needed a funny little puppy sleeping at the end of her bed. He was sent to love a man who very much needed a funny little dog to help him better understand his God. He was sent to love a woman who needed the furry reminder of love pressed tight against her whenever she sat on the couch. You have done well with your calling, Pepper. You have been faithful to the end. There is nothing more you need to do.

Well, Pepper made it through that day,

and, in fact,

was eating and drinking and back to normal by evening,

and remained with us for several more months before he was hit and killed by a car.

But, when I wrote those words about Pepper,

I once again saw myself and my relationship with my Lord.

I saw Him saying to me,

“My son, if only I could tell you what I’m thinking. If only I could tell you that there is nothing more you need to do because I have already done it all for you. I did not bring you into this world for what you could do. I brought you into this world because I love you. When you finally responded to My love, and chose to love Me in return, you fulfilled the purpose for which I brought you into this world. There is nothing more I require from you. Because we love each other, we will share projects together. Some of those projects we will share because they are needed for your own healing and freedom. Some of those projects we will share simply because it’s fun to do them together. And some we will share because through them it will help others to discover My love. But never confuse those projects with your purpose in this world. Your purpose with Me is the same as Pepper’s purpose has been with you. Your purpose has always, only been to live in love with Me.”

You see, there truly is a great romance taking place in this world,

a romance between us and our God.

He is the one who seeks us out.

He is the one who seeks to break through our defenses,

to go beyond our fears,

and our shame,

and our bondage,

and our addictions,

to speak to us more loudly

than all the screaming voices of religion around us,

voices that turn relationship into ritual and religious games.

And the message He wants us to hear,

first of all, most of all is the message of His love for us.

And the words He spoke to Israel in their rebellion

are the same words He speaks to us.

JER 31:3 "I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore I have drawn you with lovingkindness.”

A few minutes ago I made a statement I want to repeat.

I said that if you cannot honestly describe your own history with God as a love story,

then you have not yet seen the truth of what is really going on.

I don’t know what your own personal history with God looks like.

I don’t know where you fear Him,

or where you think He has failed you,

or been unfair with you,

or failed to meet your needs in the way you thought He should.

I do know that all of those

are common human responses to God.

They grow out of the collision of His truth

with our deeply flawed and distorted perceptions of reality.

But I do know

that the beginning of all correct understanding of our God is found in these six words:

“For God so loved the world...”

And I know, too,

that the pathway to true romance,

the pathway to the growth of a truly deep love relationship,

whether it’s a human love relationship,

or the growth of our love relationship with our God,

the pathway that leads us

to a true depth of love is never what we would expect.

When Sandee and I were dating

we both did everything possible

to make ourselves as presentable to one another as possible.

We carefully selected activities to share together

that were designed to be enjoyable.

We did a great deal of eating out.

We shared walks together,

and drives together,

and watched free movies together at the Soldotna Public Library.

(Entertainment opportunities in Soldotna in 1976 were far more limited than they are now.)

But through all of that fun stuff during those early days,

what we gained most

was not so much love as it was the hope of love for one another.

But, do you know when true love has grown the deepest in our relationship with one another?

It wasn’t on the vacations,

or the anniversaries,

or the dinners out.

It was when we sat together through the night

holding our infant Joni Sue,

listening to every struggling breath she took

after a violent allergic reaction

that caused her throat to nearly swell shut.

It was as we talked and talked and talked again

in the early years of our life together,

trying to figure out where we should be

and what we should be doing with our lives.

It was during that year we moved to Texas,

wondering what in the world we were doing,

knowing the only real resource we had was one another.

It was during Joni’s first year in college

when she was going through tremendous emotional pain,

waiting together each day

until the phone would ring

and we’d hear her voice

and know she’d made it through one more day.

Love, true love has always grown the most

when we have gone through times of pain

and known that we do not go through them alone,

knowing that our mate is right there with us,

and will remain right there with us no matter what.

And it’s the same way in this great divine romance with our God.

We think we can hear His voice of love the best

by His fixing everything in our lives that’s broken.

And it’s certainly true that He does a great deal of fixing,

and healing,

and delivering us from evil.

But we discover the power of His love most clearly

when we find the reality of that love

through His presence with us when life is at its worst.

The 18^th Psalm says it far better than I can,

so I’ll use the first 6 verses of that Psalm

to try to pull theses thoughts together.

The Psalm begins by saying:

PSA 18:1 "I love You, O Lord, my strength."

PSA 18:2 The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, My God, my rock, in whom I take refuge; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

PSA 18:3 I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised, And I am saved from my enemies.

Those are the words that grow out of the Psalmist’s involvement

in his own personal divine romance with his Creator.

In effect he cries out to His God,

“I love You! I love You! I love You! I love You!”

But then he goes on to reveal to us

where that love became a reality in his life.

PSA 18:4 ¶ The cords of death encompassed me, And the torrents of ungodliness terrified me.

PSA 18:5 The cords of Sheol surrounded me; The snares of death confronted me.

PSA 18:6 In my distress I called upon the Lord, And cried to my God for help; He heard my voice out of His temple, And my cry for help before Him came into His ears.

Romance, true romance is so very different from what we think.

The real thing grows not from the soft music and candle lite.

It comes when we discover that the one who loves us is with us,

by us,

for us no matter what we may face.

And nowhere is that more true

than with the greatest romance any of us will ever know,

the divine romance going on between us and our God.