"Love One Another"

I just finished Les Miserables, by Victor Hugo.  The first time I was a junior in high school.  I loved it.

Ballard High School...those were the days!

  Aren't I cute?!  That's me, second from the left in the middle!

The second time was fourteen years ago when Blackstone Audio put out an unabridged recording of it, narrated by Frederick Davidson.  I was floored. 

 

God's timing is impeccable, as this third time, again via the downloaded copy I now proudly own of Blackstone Audio's recording, I actually get it. 

Les Miserables is such a universally known and loved story, that you will forgive me "giving away" the ending:  Jean ValJean dies.  You're shocked, I know.  These are the words he spoke on his deathbed to his much cherished Cosette and Marius: 

Love each other dearly always.  There is scarcely anything else in the world but that, to love one another.

And as I said, this time, (third time's a charm, remember?) I get it. 

In high school I loved it because it was lofty and grand and exciting and had the ring of truth I could intuitively hear, though I wouldn't have been able to define it.  Fourteen years ago I was floored because the characters I had come to love in high school were so beautifully and sensitively brought to life by the narrating skills of Frederick Davidson.  But this time, (bear with me while I say it again,) I actually get it.  Not because of Mr. Hugo or Mr. Davidson, but because, through the loving afflictions of the Lord, I have finally learned what love is. 

As a teenager, I thought I knew what love was because I was a "Christian", and "loved" God.  I knew I loved God because I faithfully did all the things good Christian girls were supposed to do:  I went to church Sunday mornings, Sunday nights, Tuesday nights for choir and orchestra, Wednesday nights for youth group, Thursday nights for Jr High Bible Study, which I helped lead, occasional Friday night activites, and Saturday night prayer meetings.  I "witnessed" to my friends at high school, read my Bible at home and prayed daily, and holding tightly to the belief that, in doing these things, I was pleasing God.  But wait, there's more!  I obeyed my parents, shunned profanity, substance abuse and sex outside of marriage.  I studied hard, kept my room clean, earned my own spending money and ate dinner with my family.  I espoused myself to the most virtuous ideals, and found great hope in aligning myself with such pure motives.  I did all these things sincerely, from the heart.

Don't get me wrong.  I didn't believe the lie that many "Christian" groups perpetuate that God loved me because I did those things.  I knew my Bible better than that!  I knew God loved me of His own initiative.  But I did those things believing that they would make me good.  How mistaken I was!

By the time I heard the recording of Les Miserables fourteen years ago, I had become a pastor's wife and mother of four beautiful daughters.  I went to church a little less often, seeing as I had more responsibilities with a family, but I pretty much maintained the same values and lifestyle, dragging my homeschooled children along with me.  I knew a little more about love because by then I had dropped the ball on several of my ideals, and had therefore experienced God's forgiveness more intimately.   But doing all those good things was still my default, and I still believed they made me a good person. 

That's my fourth daughter there, third child from the left, in the bring pink stockings!,                   participating in one of the many church activities we joined.

But even as I was listening to Mr. Davidson's heartbreaking rendition of Jean ValJean's deathbed scene, horrible things were happening and had happened to my family.  Some were out of my control, and some were by my control.  But all of them happened because I didn't actually know how to love.  And in not actually loving my children, and in allowing my husband to not actually love our children, I was quite literally breaking their hearts.  Years of pressure to conform to an image of godliness, without the pure, holy oil of true love in our relationships, took their toll on us, and some years back my perfect little world blew up. 

But as I said, God's timing is impeccable, and He was ready, now that I was finally ready, with help and wisdom and revelation.  Through good friends and faithful ministers of God's Word, the Holy Spirit showed me my shallowness and falseness and bankruptcy of spirit.  In my debased state, I was cleansed of my wicked and prideful ways.  Since then, His love has been steadily filling me with courage to get up and learn His ways of love for real.  

So now, when I hear Jean ValJean bless his children with the words, "Love one another, " I get it.  And I am so thankful!