The Pace of Love
Eph 5:1 Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children;
:2 And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.
I noticed something while on a run the other day. I have this tendency to be challenged by the hills, and whenever this challenge is before me, I tend to press the pace a bit. If I just keep the pace established before the hill and, even better, slow down a bit, I am quite able to successfully make it to the top without killing myself. Maybe it’s pride (not wanting to be seen moving along so slowly) or maybe it’s just wanting the increased effort to more quickly come to an end. For whatever reason, this tendency in me, if yielded to, will insure that I don’t make it to the top, that I end up on the side of the road sucking air.
This reminded me of a time when Dad took me on a hunting trip on horseback. We spent several days right up close to timberline in Colorado, fishing and trekking through the surrounding mountainsides, looking for elk. Our hunting trips together were always a great experience, but this one was particularly enjoyable because we got to ride around on horses rather than wear ourselves out on the steep trails.
I’ve always noticed that horses have my same tendency to be challenged by hills, responding with a sort of lunging action- a definite breaking of pace. One day, while ascending an extremely steep slope, the danger of this reaction was very close to disastrous for the pack horse Dad was leading. The trail reduced the intensity of the incline by taking a more horizontal path from right to left across the slope, and then curving sharply back to the right in a continuously zig-zagging pattern. We had progressed quite a ways up the hillside, when the pack horse decided to take a slight short cut on one of the curves and go straight up the hill to where Dad had already circled back to the left. Just that small section of dramatically greater incline, although just a few feet, caused the horse to begin lunging forward in some desperation to overcome the steepness. In his frantic scramble, he lost his footing and, instead of arriving safely on the path above, began to tumble all the way back down the slope, where he finally came to rest just in front of a pointed stump that would surely have punctured his side if he’d have landed on it.
To know and love God is to follow Him on this walk, this trek, through countryside that, while oftentimes flat and easy, also has extreme slopes that are ascended in a zig-zag pattern. If we are to continue following Him, these trails must be climbed, and the natural tendency to break the pace of the Father must be resisted and overcome in order to progress safely to the top. If we, for what ever reason, begin to respond to the challenge of the incline with increased speed or desperate lunging, there is a very good chance that we will end up either on the side of the path sucking air, or at the bottom of the hill amongst many dangerous objects.
We will surely be faced with an endless rising of temptations in our own flesh and in relationships. The natural tendency will always be to feel that we can move forward in our own strength, our own personality, and our own emotional necessity to cut a corner and desperately lunge past the safe and sure pace and path of the Father’s love. If we will but trust in the steps and the timing He chooses, if we will but yield to His way of righteousness even though it challenges every fiber of our flesh, there will be a great reward of arriving at the destination He has chosen, and arriving there at His side. Pride, sin and self-seeking will surely bring a fall, but the walk of love will yield a sweet smelling offering before Him of mountains climbed and victories won.
