In my May 19 Morning Musing, I shared this verse and the impact it is having on me right now. I have been deeply challenged by these words. This pandemic has not been easy on a whole host of levels, and while I am grateful for all that I have, I too have struggled with the range of emotions and reactions that have come over me as I make my way through this with everyone else. There are days when loving people seems nearly impossible. And yet, loving people is the very lens, the very ground, the very heart of everything I do or say. It is what defines me (and all followers of Jesus) because God first loved me (and everyone else) through Jesus.

That was easier to live out three months ago.

I have been studying human behavior for a while now, so I am really good at doing all the intellectual analysis as to why I am struggling or why others are behaving the way they are and usually that is helpful to me, but not right now. Right now isn’t a matter of knowing, it isn’t a matter of the intellect. It is a matter of how we “be”, it is a matter of the heart. Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians that knowledge is not the end all and be all (and that is saying a lot coming from him), that knowledge must be tempered with love. Knowledge just thrown about becomes a stumbling block to others and prohibits their ability to hear or understand or want to do either of those things. So in a situation like a pandemic, when our lives are so tightly bound to the lives and actions of our neighbor, we as followers of Jesus temper our knowledge with love.

If you watched or listened to my sermon on Wednesday, May 20, you heard me wrestle with what does this love look like? I know that there are many people who are trying to act in love, and their love is not being received as such. So many people are trying to impart knowledge with love, and it is not being received well. So how do we love one another in a time of high anxiety? Well, I keep finding myself going back to this one truth: We cannot will someone to change, we can only change ourselves. In a time of high anxiety, such as we find ourselves in, I (or you) can only change how I (or you) react, how I (or you) behave, how I (or you) love. For me, that means spending time asking myself, what is behind my reactions so that I can then see others in a more generous way, so that I can love others.

There are no easy answers here, but friends, we have been preparing for such a time as this for many years, as we learned from each other and from Jesus, as we challenged ourselves to love one another even when we disagree, as we came to God over and over again to ask for forgiveness when we get it wrong. We have the tools needed to find our way through if we do it together.

“Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God.” has a depth and breadth to it that we have never known until this moment, and we don’t always manage it, but we hold strongly to the truth that we were first loved by our God, and we don’t lose that when we forget or don’t quite know how to love one another. We return to that love, bathe in God’s grace, and we start again.

Let us be known for the love and grace we show the world and ourselves as we make our way through a pandemic.