Fear Love

This one goes out to the late night DJ.

I have no idea what it is about driving around at midnight. But, I find something special about being awake at the beginning of a new day. I say driving because one element that makes being awake this late is the radio. Maybe I’m just an inspired night writer or maybe it’s that DJ’s in the middle of the night know exactly what I want to hear.

I recently had a guy tell me he loved me. When I asked why he didn’t call he said, “I shouldn’t have to call everyday.” Something about a code and friendship. It ended in our agreeing that we needed to not talk for a while. I’m not sure how an argument caused by not talking is supposed to be solved by not talking; but mostly, all I heard was a boy in a man’s voice freaking out. So, I’ve been thinking a lot about love lately. I find there is this huge sense of fear surrounding a word like that.

I asked my good friend Luke how he was doing tonight. We had a good laugh as he said, “I’m seeing one girl more than any others.” The thing about Luke is, he’s incredibly afraid of commitment because he got hurt really bad early in the game.

Luke is like me. He loves easily. He just doesn’t call it love, even though that is what it is. He just happens to fall out of love as easily as he entered. But, he’s given his heart and the ones he gives his heart to, he never stops loving. I know this because he’s shared his heart with me over these girls. He rarely admits hurt. But, there is a tone in his voice that tells me deep within lies a romantic.

I’ve never heard anyone say to me in their final days, “I wish I said I love you less.” I’ve never received wisdom that said, “Hold onto your love, don’t commit.” Every sappy song about the end of life says I wish I’d loved more and cursed less. So why is it that so many people my age are afraid of love?

John, the one whom Jesus loved writes towards the end of his days: “No fear exists where his love is. Rather, perfect love gets rid of fear, because fear involves punishment. The person who lives in fear doesn't have perfect love.” 1 John 4:18

I leave you with that. If you are afraid of love, maybe it has to do with your trust in God. Maybe if we learned to trust God more, we wouldn’t be so afraid of loving each other. And if we spent less time being afraid, we’d spend more time actually loving each other.