Love Unattached

“Whoever is wise will remember these things and begin to understand the Lord’s faithful love.” Psalm 107:43

Until we recognize love for the unearned quality of desiring the best for another, we will never understand it at all. If we attach anything to love; beauty, moral behavior, obedience, mutual admiration, we are no longer talking about love. Love has nothing to do with how another person makes me feel, or what someone else can do for me. To be “love”, it must be completely unmerited and unattached.

Most of us understand unmerited love, though we are weak in either experiencing or giving it. But unattached love is rare. Perhaps the best way to think is to consider its opposite in the extreme. Two young people are in the first blush of romantic love. They cannot bear to be apart. Hearing the simple sound of their lover’s name causes their hearts to be faster and the world to glow a little richer.

But, as we all know, most first romances do not last. In my weekly time with teens this week, one 16 year-old girl counted up the boyfriends she has had so far and came up with 23! So much for love that lasts. But, if we just think a bit, we know ourselves how many crushes and attractions the volatile mix of teenage hormones created in our own adolescence.

But, while we are in the midst of that relationship, we swear we will love no other. And, once that first breakup topples our world, the once sunny world turns to black despair. Many times the beloved becomes the object of scorn as our hopes of love implode around us. This adolescent infatuation is “attached” love. We love him because he makes us feel happy. We love her because we feel alive around her.

Unattached love is completely the opposite. It is the love that reaches out to ones who have nothing to offer in return. Not only that, unattached love risks loving those who may harm us. Loving one’s enemies does not come without risk. But, the love of enemies is not the epitome of unattached love. We still have an emotional investment with an enemy. We hope that our love will soften their anger and turn them to a friend.

Unattached love cares for the one with the least to offer. It is painting the house of a destitute widow. It is answering the phone for the hundredth time, even though the caller seems unaffected by our relationship. It is listening once more to the alcoholic who swears this is the last time. Unattached love is the gamble that our lives actually make a difference.

God’s love for us, in the best sense of the word, is also unattached. He did not love us, send His Son to die, and make us part of His family by faith because He was lonely. There is not one thing we can add to God. He is already perfect within Himself. Our love does not enhance His being a single iota. What that means is, when He loves us, it is always, without exception, a completely unattached act.

Psalm 107 describes God’s actions, His saving love, towards His people. We see Him loving the homeless in verses 4-9. Then, in verses 10-16, He shatters the iron bars of those imprisoned, many of whom had refused to listen to the God Most High. He heals the sick in verses 17-22, even though some suffered because they were “fools and turned against God”, suffering for the “evil they did”. (Verse 17). Sailors at sea facing storms so dangerous that courage was lost found Him calming the raging sea. (verses 23-32). From verse 33 on God disciplines those who persistently do “evil things”, but continues His acts of mercy, rescuing “the poor from their misery”.

Every section ends with a refrain that says, “Thank the Lord for His faithful love and the amazing things He does for people”. The final verse entreats us to wisely think about all these loving acts of God. The entire Psalm is a saga to a love that rescues the helpless, feeds the hungry, guides the hopeless, and saves even the rebellious. No one is forced to accept His overtures of love so that the wicked “see it and don’t know what to say.” (verse 42). But, the people who are wise will think deeply about the kind of love God offers.

What would change in your life if you truly understood that God’s love is not attached to any behavior on your part? He is constantly offering His overflowing grace, never holding it back. What fears would melt? What hurts would mend? What new ways of living would sprout like the first blooms of spring?

Take some time and do what this last verse suggests: Remember these things and begin to understand the Lord’s faithful love!