So, I did a bit of research to find out why love hurts.  Most of us see the connection between social and physical pain as a figurative one. We agree that “love hurts,” but we don’t think it hurts the way that, say, being kicked in the shin hurts. At the same time, life often presents a compelling argument that the two types of pain share a common source. Older, devotedly loving couples frequently make the news because they can’t physically survive without one another. In one example from early 2012, Marjorie and James Landis of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, who had been married for 65 years, died just 88 minutes apart.

Truth is you don’t have to be a sentimentalist to believe in broken hearts — being a subscriber to the New England Journal of Medicine will do. A few years ago, a group of doctors at Johns Hopkins University reported a rare but lethal heart condition caused by acute emotional distress. The problem is technically known as “stress cardiomyopathy,” but the press likes to call it “broken heart syndrome,” and medical professionals don’t object to the nickname.  In the past few years, psychology researchers have found a good deal of literal truth embedded in the metaphorical phrases comparing love to pain.

Love may actually hurt, like “hurt” hurt, after all.  So, my wondering is this;

If God’s love is greater, deeper, wider, than humans can wrap their heads around and produce; how much hurt do we cause the heart of Jesus when we betray Him and resort to following evil’s desire to destroy us?  Jesus was Son of God.  He came to earth and lived as Son of Man who felt the sting of hurts of all kinds, inside and out. 

How do we know?  This passage right here…”Jesus became visibly upset” because one of his chosen disciples “will stab him in the back”, betraying him—and the God who sent Him.

John 13, The Message

The One Who Ate Bread at My Table

^18-20 “I’m not including all of you in this. I know precisely whom I’ve selected, so as not to interfere with the fulfillment of this Scripture:

The one who ate bread at my table

Will stab me in the back.

“I’m telling you all this ahead of time so that when it happens you will believe that I am who I say I am. Make sure you get this right: Receiving someone I send is the same as receiving me, just as receiving me is the same as receiving the One who sent me.”

²¹ After he said these things, Jesus became visibly upset, and then he told them why. “One of you is going to betray me.”

^22-25 The disciples looked around at one another, wondering who on earth he was talking about. One of the disciples, the one Jesus loved dearly, was reclining against him, his head on his shoulder. Peter motioned to him to ask who Jesus might be talking about. So, being the closest, he said, “Master, who?”

^26-27 Jesus said, “The one to whom I give this crust of bread after I’ve dipped it.” Then he dipped the crust and gave it to Judas, son of Simon the Iscariot. As soon as the bread was in his hand, Satan entered him.

“What you must do,” said Jesus, “do. Do it and get it over with.”

^28-29 No one around the supper table knew why he said this to him. Some thought that since Judas was their treasurer, Jesus was telling him to buy what they needed for the Feast, or that he should give something to the poor.

³⁰ Judas, with the piece of bread, left. It was night.

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

Does love hurt?  Yes.  Do we break the heart of God when we sin?  Yes, we do.  But not for the human reasons we might expect.  God’s heart is broken because of our refusal to accept His best for us.  God knows what could be!  God does not enjoy seeing us hurt from the effects of our sins.  God’s heart, full of unfailing, relentless love for us breaks when we turn away from all we were created to be.  God knows our sins carry burdens we do not need to bear.  God loved us so much, He sent His One and Only Son, Jesus, to rectify and redeem our sin condition.  But when we say no, Love hurts—for us! God longs to pour out his blessings over us, but when we refuse, oh how it must hurt.  How incredible that our God patiently waits for us to say yes to His best.

It seems the closer we get Jesus, realizing the depth of His love for us, we begin to love more and more like He loves us.  The more we love the more we want to know Jesus who saved us and set us free from our sins “as far as the east is from the west.”  Paul writes of his own desire to know Christ but with an added feature many believers miss (or avoid); “I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead! (Philippians 3:10-11) 

Suffer? Paul words are more like a prayer; asking Jesus to break his heart of those things that break the heart of Jesus.  Only then can we be more like Jesus with right motivations to love unconditionally like Jesus!  We, too will suffer betrayal in life.  We will suffer heartache and troubles.  We, at times, will be the betrayers who need forgiveness.  How will we respond?  Our response depends on Who we know, believe, and love with all our hearts, minds, and souls.

We are not perfect.  No surprise, right?! But we are perfectly forgiven by Jesus who even prayed for those who nailed Him to a cross to suffer physical, excruciating pain.  Love hurts.  Inside and out, love hurts.  “Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing.”  Could be Jesus meant, they don’t know the love we have to give, Father.  They don’t know the gift of Life being offered because of our love for them. They don’t know the treasure of possessing our Love that goes beyond all other human forms of conditional love.  They just don’t know love because they don’t know You.

“While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) How haunting are these words right now as we go deeper to understand the love God has for us!

Paul continues, “I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us.” Philippians 3:12-14

God calls each of us who believe to Love God and Love Others.  Yes, the deeper we go in His love, our hearts will ache when love is not returned or worse yet, betrayed. But does that stop us from loving like Jesus?  Remember, Jesus washed the feet of Judas that night as well as all the other feet in the room!  So, absolutely not.  God’s love is forever. So, we press on in His love…

“Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.

And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans  8:35-39 NLT

Love hurts—but in a wonderous way, revealed in Jesus, our Savior and Lord, who experienced all forms of hurt on earth, but loved us enough to die for our sins. 

Lord,

Thank you for teaching us yet another reason to love you back, follow in your ways, with attitudes of gratefulness—all because of your love in us that is greater than we can imagine or dream!  Help us to press on in knowing you, believing what you say, and growing in your love!  I am yours and you are mine.  I am loved by the King of kings and Lord of lords—oh, what a blessed thought!  I will meditate on this all day long.

In Jesus Name, Amen