WHAT YOU TALK ABOUT WHEN YOU TALK ABOUT LOVE - (4th and final part)
On finding new meanings of love
Love is long-suffering and kind. Love is not jealous, it does not brag, does not get puffed up, does not behave indecently, does not look for its own interests, does not become provoked. It does not keep account of the injury. It does not rejoice over unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.
- 1 Corinthians 13:4-8
A new incarnation of love, one not forged in the crucible of faith, crept in slowly, like the first rays of dawn that peek over the horizon. Or perhaps it was you who sidled your way to this love, from your newfound love for life.
You had been taught to hold onto this imperfect life only with a tenuous grip. Your life was a hospital gown, meant only for the brief moment when you lay upon the operating table, waiting for a new heart. And if the surgeon asked you to get rid of the gown, you would trust them to know what was best for you. The surgeon had told you how fleeting this life was, that the world was wicked and destined for destruction; the surgeon taught you to “not become fearful of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, fear him who can destroy both soul and body in Ge·henʹna.”
In a hospital full of gowns, do not be afraid to lose one gown. Abraham was ready to sacrifice his only son. And god had sacrificed his. These were your examples.
You were instructed to remain neutral, to avoid entanglements with the affairs of this world. It meant turning away from politics and higher education, from wealth and career, from anything that did not serve the cause of spreading the good news of God's kingdom. For why pursue these things when the world was doomed to fall? Why decorate a house that was marked for demolition?
It made sense then not to love this life, this temporary existence that would soon be replaced by a perfect, eternal life without sickness or pain, sorrow or death. You would not join the armed forces even if you were threatened with prison or death. You prayed often for the brothers in South Korea many of whom were in jail for being conscientious objectors, refusing to join the army. It made sense to refuse a blood transfusion even if you were going to die in the process. You had read all of the literature about how dangerous blood transfusions were and about brothers who secretly had blood transfusions then ended up dying due to complications. They died in disobedience— the worst way to die— and tragically would never be resurrected to enjoy eternity in paradise on earth. If however you were to die while refusing a transfusion, you would be rewarded for dying faithful. There was nothing better than dying faithful.
The talks and articles in the Watchtower constantly reinforced this. Just in case you had forgotten the material was packaged and repackaged like soup reheated with a little bit more seasoning added each time.
Guard Your Sense Of Urgency
Maintain Your Sense Of Urgency
Time Is Running Out
Serving With a Sense of Urgency.
Most of them were based on Bible verses like 1Corinthians 7:29-31:
Moreover, this I say, brothers, the time left is reduced. From now on let those who have wives be as though they had none, and those who weep as those who do not weep, and those who rejoice as those who do not rejoice, and those who buy as those who do not possess and those making use of the world as those not using it to the full; for the scene of this world is changing.
Although this first letter of Paul to the Corinthians was written nearly 2,000 years ago, around 54 CE at Ephesus, Asia Minor, you had learnt that Bible prophecies pointed to the fact that you were in fact living in the last days of this wicked system of things. Based on calculations done by a few old men in the US, Jesus had already returned and had been reigning on earth since 1914 (hence the first world war) and it was only a matter of time for everything to end in God's great war of Armageddon. Out with the old. In with the new.
And so in what you call your limbo years —the years when you had newly left the truth, the years when your heart and head were still brimming with all the fears you had been conditioned to have, when you were still afraid of flying, afraid of driving, afraid of falling sick and dying outside the truth; the years when everything felt like a punishment for leaving — every failure, every tragedy… you still could not enjoy anything, plant any seed that would grow and blossom into happiness. You could not settle down, make a home, enjoy life. Your Biblical sense of urgency held on desperately, whispering to you how foolish it was to want to enjoy a world that was fast crumbling, how foolish to try to save anything in this world, to try to participate in politics or social life as if you were not taught that the world was destined to go from bad to worse. Think! Think! Urgency implored. Who do you think you are fooling?
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