Love is all you need . . . .

“To love another person is to see the face of God” . . . Jean Valjean

Tomorrow is my Granddaughter Clementine’s birthday. She would have been 17.

I thought of her as I read those words from Victor Hugo's Les Miserables. Clemmie was unable to communicate verbally during her short life, but to love her and to look into her beautiful face was in some way to see the face of God. Henri Nouwen speaks of the heart as “the place where God dwells and holds you . . a place . . .where all of you and all of God can dwell”. Clemmie’s heart was in that place. She had no pretence; what you saw in her face reflected the truth of her heart, and her heart was - and is - in-dwelt and held safe by God. She was free from all of the stuff that gets in the way of our finding peace in the reality of God’s love - she had none of our ego and inner conflict, no striving and self-doubt, no emotional or spiritual defence shield. In spite of the physical pain from which she is now gloriously free, in the depths of her being there was never anything between Clemmie’s heart and God’s love. She was and remains a gift who came wrapped up in sadness but brought with her the unfiltered presence of God. It is always in the darkness that His light shines brightest.

Victor Hugo’s Jean Valjean understood darkness. He was a man whose life’s journey reflected the complexities of the human condition, from brokenness, love, suffering and loss, deep sorrow and great joy, to forgiveness, restoration and redemption.

The Bible holds other such powerful stories about real people struggling with real life challenges. It’s sad that we so often read, interpret and teach it as an ancient dry text book when it is alive with revelation of the full picture of what it means to be human; to be made in the image of our Creator, to lose our way and to be found again by Love.

Reading Victor Hugo prompted me this week to go back to the story of Jacob in Genesis.

Life was always a struggle for Jacob. He didn’t just wrestle with God one lonely sleepless night, when he was running scared from his brother whom he was convinced was about to kill him, with good reason - Jacob had not exactly been the best brother. . . or son . . or husband.

All his life he had been wrestling, with his father, his brother, his uncle . . . he longed to hear his father say he loved him, even if he had to lie to hear it, he was cheated by his Uncle Laban (it ran in the family), then got his own back by various nefarious means - at every turn life put up barricades in Jacob’s way, even when he tried to sort it. Until the night he wrestled with God himself - who else could shatter his hip merely by touching it - and realised that this was his moment, this time he could not let him go until he blessed him.

He didn’t need to be told God’s name - he knew - and he called the place where the meeting occurred Peniel, meaning face of God, because he had seen God face to face.

He has seen the face of God - and he is utterly changed. The next day he goes out to meet Esau and finds him running towards him, not with murderous intent as expected but instead to enfold Jacob in a brotherly embrace. Esau loves him! Jacob can’t quite believe it, and offers his cattle, sheep, anything to secure his brother’s love, until, when Esau has made it plain that he loves Jacob and wants nothing from him, the penny drops, and he says “When I saw your face it was as the face of God smiling on me” .

How will people today see the face of God?

Maybe it will be through the pious ways, judgmental attitudes, bold prophetic proclamations and rigid moral standards of those who claim to follow Christ?

or maybe will it be by our love.

To be fully known and fully loved is the need of every heart.

That’s part of our problem though isn’t it? Many of us who claim to know Christ have difficulty believing that he actually truly loves us, as we are. I have always struggled with what it means to be loved by God - and with understanding that God could possibly love me, when I know all too well the mountain of failings, deceit, hypocrisy, lovelessness and self-serving that course through my being on any given day. It is really hard to believe, and to receive unconditional love.

I think that’s what God wanted Jacob to know when he wrestled with him that night - ”You’re a pain Jacob, a real pain - but I not only love you I actually really like you and if necessary I’ll make you walk with a limp for the rest of your life just so you don’t forget!”

One of the big tragedies of church life is that so many people who understand themselves to be Christ-followers have not only no concept of God’s love for them personally, but consider it presumptuous to believe such a thing. When we don’t really believe God loves and likes us, we feel the need to earn his approval by doubling up on our religious observance, validating ourselves with our years of loyal service, hiding our unworthiness behind our holiness shield. We can reel off John 3:16 to anyone who will listen - “God so loved the world . . .” but people will not listen if they sense an emptiness behind the facade.

I remember one particular Bible discussion group in my home. At the end of the morning an elderly lady, who had been a stalwart of one of the local churches for over 50 years, came up to me and whispered through her tears that she had never, before that morning, heard that God actually loved and liked her personally - and while she was blown away with the news she also found it quite threatening. I fully understand that. It is easier to keep God in the religious compartment of my life than it is to allow him to break my heart, put it back together again and then live in it. A relationship requires that I let God into the deepest recesses of my soul, and that is scary. I think that’s what Jacob did the night he wrestled with God.

Maybe it is time to stop wrestling with God, and to learn from Clemmie what it means simply to allow ourselves to be loved and held close to His heart. Then perhaps people will begin to see in us the loving, smiling face of God.

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