Apr
12
2010
The heart of it all
“I love you, O Lord, my strength.” Psalm 18:1
As the years have gone by, I have lost faith in some things. But one thing burns more and more brightly — love for the Lord. That I esteem as the heart of it all.
Looking back to my early years and memories of simple believers loving the Lord together as a church — that is what I respect and admire. Looking forward into the future, I want to help reproduce that shining reality for the next generation. This love is not the only thing that must happen. But without it, we die inside.
I am all for theological articulation and defense. I recognize no false dichotomy pitting love and truth against one another. But theological discourse can be unloving. It can leave Jesus out.
I am stripped down to this essential: love for the Lord, who is my strength. Only he has gotten me through. Only he is perfectly faithful. Only he communicates to my heart the love that keeps me alive. And he does. I am thankful.
See by faith the risen Jesus standing over us all, holding all authority in heaven and on earth, blessing us according to his Word. He and he alone, he personally and directly and immediately, he himself is and always will be “strength to his people in every sense in which they can need strength” (W. S. Plumer, Psalms [Edinburgh, 1990], page 235).
Let us love him.