The Duty Side of Love

I live in a culture that tells me if I don't feel something, then I shouldn't do it.  If I don't feel like it, it's not obligatory.  Obligation is generally considered negative.  Especially when it comes to love.  In love, if it's not felt you are not required to do it.  If I don't feel love, I have a plethora of options as to what I could do.

This month I've learned something that's just starting to really sink in: Duty is not evil.  Even in love and marriage.  Not only is it not an evil to be avoided, but it's crucial to the lifelong commitment of marriage.

My husband's sister passed away only six months after being diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer.  The original prognosis was 2-5 years.  She was 37.  My husband, while he had been able to prepare for what the future may hold since a few months ago, nothing can truly prepare you for the weight of that kind of grief.  We had planned months ago to come visit the family on the other side of the country for the first half of August.  Those plans got changed with the news she had been taken into the hospital with liver failure and was becoming somewhat delusional earlier this summer.  We changed our tickets to leave the next day.  Thus began what ended up being a month long journey of ups and downs and life being turned upside down.  In the middle of the feeling helplessness, we walked away from all sense of routine that had existed up unto that point.  But there was a deep sense that overwhelmed me...just be available for what my husband and his family needed.  I was to put my feelings aside for this time and push forward with doing everything I could be aware of where I was needed and how I could serve.

This led to a month, almost straight, of opportunities to serve, crucial conversations and many tears.  Through the complications of grief and family dynamics, there was this profound Strength that I could never have provided for myself.  I was amazed.  Every day the Lord provided me with the exact manna I would need to get through those hours and days.  I never had more than what I needed, but I was never short.  God gave my heart a laser focus on "Be there for them.  Let ME take care of you."  There were days of just aching for normalcy, of wanting to go home, of wishing none of this was real.  But it was real.  Very real.

Duty kicked in.  That sense of obligation from wedding vows that state for "better or worse."  This was definitely the latter.  My husband's grief and sadness was a distraction at best and an inundating and all-consuming wave at worst.  I temporarily lost my husband who was (and is) sensitive to my needs and desires, who saw me when no one else did, who always made me feel first (aside from Jesus).  All of a sudden, he was only seeing me from time to time, and the hurt of that only seemed to be amplified by the weight of trying to help as much as I could, to take the weight of the kids off his shoulders as often as possible, to make sure I was in touch with the needs of others in his family as often as I could be. 

But as tempted as I would be to look inwardly and feel sorry for myself, God graciously redirected me.  What if underneath His "service" of my needs was an underlying selfishness?  What if He only served when He felt like it?  What if He would have said "no" to the cross because of what it would cost Him?  What does living out His love look like, especially when the hurt of the other party is so deep? 

To be clear, these questions did NOT increase my feelings of love in such a depleted time.  What it did ignite in me was Love's companion, Duty.  Feelings are so fickle.  Sometimes I was fine, other times I was irritated, other times I was angry.  Feelings are a wonderful thermometer, but a terrible lord.  I couldn't let my feelings rule me and my reactions.  Because of my relationship with Christ, He calls me to live differently.  He's given me my emotions, I am not a robot.  However, He lived out the example of what it is to live a selfless life, to love the unlovable, to serve both the lowly and the haughty.  He loved the grieving.  He loved the hurting. He loved the selfish.  He loved the self-justifying.  But He never let their actions (and His feelings about them) trump what He knew He had to do.  He was a Man on a Mission.  He was there to extend the hand and love of God to the Earth.  This meant doing some things that, honestly, if it were me, I would've just thrown down the gauntlet and called down lightning from Heaven because I was so angry.  Jesus got down on His knees and cleaned the feet of the man who would betray Him.  Not because His feelings told Him to, but because it was right.  It was love.  It was humility.  It was His DUTY.  He was committed to the Father's story and His desire to redeem us.

Therefore, He called me in that time to live out Philippians 2.  By that I mean, put my desires and myself behind me so that I may love those He has put in front of me.  I needed to see that need and respond, not because I felt like it, but because I was committed to the Gospel of Jesus and I was committed to my husband and I'm bound for life to see him through all of that God has woven into the tapestry of his life.  There were no bubbly or kind feelings.  Just a duty that sprung up through compassion, that kind of compassion Jesus experienced as many were grieving the death of Lazarus in John 11.  It's a gut instinct that says not just that something is broken, but that immediately asks your heart, "What do I do?  I have to do something."  The duty that comes from that place is a moving experience, because it drills past my feelings and into the roots of where my commitment is.  The actions of the last month have come from a place of commitment, and not loving feelings.  But I've realized that's the power of commitment, at least the kind of commitment Jesus calls us to throughout Scripture.

Doing the things of love, without necessarily feeling the love you’re portraying, is not weakness...but strength.  As Tim Keller once said, "Do the things love requires, and the feelings will follow."  When we act in love despite not feeling love, we honor our Father.  We are honoring our commitment to His Gospel and His calling in our lives.  It actually causes the roots of love to be allowed to become deeper in the soil of His Gospel.  It makes our foundations stronger.  When we choose our commitments above our feelings to give Glory to God and honor what He has told us our lives are to look like, He sees us.  No matter the accolades or lack thereof, He fills us. 

Our duty to love our spouses and those who live in this world who bear His image, causes us to act when we don't have the motivation.  The "I have to" or "I need to" phrases in our life are often the things that make our commitment more steadfast than before.  I don't necessarily understand it, nor do I consistently practice it.  But this time has taught me that as life is going forward, I need to not have such a negative view of obligation in commitments.  That obligation can move us forward when other things that occur would normally cause a standstill in that relationship or in life as a whole.  This is crucial to the movement of life and the continuation of love.  Don't shy away from duty, but instead step up, even when it's really hard.  You will see so much more of the Gospel and His love for us, that didn't shy away from our pain or His own because of the commitment Jesus had to the Father and His plan of love for us.