Have you ever purchased something that required assembly to use? I am TERRIBLE at assembly. My coat rack that leans slightly to the left is a great example why. When it was first purchased, I opened the box and looked for the directions. It had pictures and seemed fairly simple. I was very optimistic that it wouldn’t take long and assembly would be a piece of cake. Halfway into the project, I wanted to throw it out the window. The easy pictures are never easy to follow. I never actually thought it was “easy” to assemble. It was so frustrating and took hours to complete.
This doesn’t just apply to furniture assembly. For many of us, when we first stepped out into the work of loving and serving others, we had a simplistic (and perhaps naïve) vision of just how easy it was going to be. Turns out, loving others is far more complicated and difficult than we originally imagined.
For me, I always wanted to adopt. It was clear to me the conviction on our lives to love and care for orphans and vulnerable children. God was unmistakably clear in his charge to his Church to care for the least of these. When Ryan and I married, we decided to plunge in and step up for kids in crisis. We felt very convicted to open our home and hearts to kids who needed a home and family for however long they needed one.
Our family took a deep breath, and plunged head-first into a world of addiction, hurt, and pain. We opened up our home to foster kiddos, knowing that loving people is an inherently dangerous thing to do. After 10 weeks of training we genuinely believed that we were ready.
Nothing could have prepared us for what was coming.
Our experience in welcoming children has turned into the of the most painful season of our lives. Yes it has been filled with so much joy, but also pain. I have experienced fear like I’ve never felt it before. Pain and anxiety have become constant companions—and the most wrenching pain that I experienced has been watching the people that I love the most become deeply wounded.
Here is what I’ve come to believe: There are no simple ways to love others. Love is costly. We are invited to love Christ in a broken world, if our love looks anything like Jesus’ love, it could cost us everything that we’ve got. Faithfully loving others like Jesus loves them inevitably means that you will experience hurt.
Stepping out to welcome the foreigner, protect the widow, defend the fatherless, and love our brothers and sisters living on the fringes of society isn’t comfortable or safe. Empowered by the Holy Spirit and motivated by the same wild, scandalous love that once rescued us, we are called to step into the good works that God has prepared in advance for us. If you have embarked on a journey to love the vulnerable and found it to be more difficult than you imagined, do not lose heart! Keep on keeping on!
How are we to respond to the pain that accompanies living lives marked by costly love?
1. Expect that loving others is going to be hard.
Don’t believe the manual claim that the task ahead of you will be simple, or that simple explanations and simple solutions are going to fix all the problems. Real life rarely presents itself in a sanitized, comfortable way.
Instead, lean into the truth that the world is broken. We know that Jesus has won the war—but the battle rages on. We shouldn’t be surprised when life is painful. We shouldn’t be surprised when relationships are difficult. We shouldn’t be surprised when hurt people hurt us.
We are to go into our service with our eyes wide open that “in this world you will have troubles” (John 16:33).
What’s the benefit of expecting it? It helps us to more fully enter into the beautiful moments of life—the hugs, the smiles, the “I love you’s.” Enjoy these moments. Savor them. But don’t be surprised when they’re intertwined with heartbreak.
When we expect challenges, we increase our ability to savor the moments of joy and cling firmly to the second part of the verse from John’s gospel: “Take heart, for I have overcome the world.” JESUS WINS
2. Call for help.
Manuals always have the same last message: Call someone.
Strong lifelong friendships don’t just happen; they take intentionality and commitment. Invest in the relationships that matter, and they will carry you in all seasons of life.
When I reached out to a friend in the midst of the pain of foster care, she responded, “We are going to walk this together, and while we don’t know God’s big picture or the end result, we will get through it. Don’t look ahead. Just do the next thing. “ In that moment, that was exactly what I needed to hear.
3. Look up. Constantly.
In moments of incredible trial, where do we fix our eyes?
- We might look back and obsess over our past. Previous failures and “if-only” scenarios can crush us, if we let them.
- We might look forward and be anxious over our future. This is especially easy when we still have questions about what is going to come in the next moment, let alone the next month or next year.
- We might look inward and become paralyzed by our hurt.
- We might look side-to-side and ask why other people seem to have it infinitely easier than we do.
We were created to be a people of hope who look up. This is not a cliché. These are true words. When life feels impossibly hard, we remember that we have nowhere else to go. As we read in Psalms 121, “I lift my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, Maker of Heaven and earth.” Look to Jesus, the One who perfectly shows us what wild, scandalous, costly, fearless love looks like in practice.
Friends, as you step out in the significant work of loving others, do it empowered by the Spirit and saturated in grace. Do it surrounded by a community of people cheering you on and supporting you. Do it knowing that God has promised to use all things, both the moments of great success and moments of heart-wrenching pain, for our good and His glory.
My hope is that we will be known as people who run to the suffering and the hurting, instead of running away. That we will stop to make time to respond to the needs all around us—even though doing so will bring both beauty and pain. That we would be prepared to live fearlessly and love relentlessly. And that we will continue to press into the dangerous work of loving like Jesus.
Koko