can you love too much?

loving too much, holding on too tight = have a good heart, need to learn to use it

i don’t remember the circumstances surrounding my thought process at the time, but i saved this line in a word document some time ago with the intent of blogging about it. when i found it again yesterday, it made me cock my head in contemplation.

is it possible to love too much - too deeply?

i speak from personal experience when i say that loving deeply can easily become an excuse for a lack of boundaries - and is what hurts, not helps build relationships. instead, i have been learning to look to Jesus as my example. His circle of friends was very small. there were the twelve disciples, his mother, martha, mary, lazarus. He wasn’t best friends with everyone, and He didn’t feel an obligation to give of Himself to everyone He met, or even to His closest friends. He had no problem offering what someone needed, then moving on. and He certainly had no problem speaking the truth, no matter how difficult.

and yet, you can’t say that Jesus didn’t love deeply. Jesus WAS love.

perhaps the answer can be found in the contrast between two of Jesus’ closest friends. in luke 10:39-42 it says that “mary sat at the Lord’s feet, listening to what he taught. but martha was distracted by the big dinner she was preparing. she came to Jesus and said, ‘Lord, doesn’t it seem unfair to you that my sister just sits here while i do all the work? tell her to come and help me.’ but the Lord said to her, ‘my dear martha, you are worried and upset over all these details! there is only one thing worth being concerned about. mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her.’”

it’s not that martha didn’t have the right motives. i’m sure she did what she did out of a deep love for her friends and family. she would probably argue that everything she did actually proved that her love was deeper. and it also doesn’t mean that being hospitable and caring for your home are not important. but Jesus asserts that it was mary, not martha, who had discovered the more important thing.

martha had a good heart. she just needed to learn how to use it. she needed to learn how to JUST BE in relationship - no clinging, no striving, no expectations.

the woman who poured perfume on Jesus’ feet (luke 7) is an example of deep, yet appropriate love. while the expression of her love did involve an action, it came from a place of deep appreciation, with nothing attached and nothing expected in return.

so i guess it depends on how you’re defining love. 1 corinthians 13 says that love is patient, kind, not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. it does not demand its own way, is not irritable and keeps no record of being wronged. it does not rejoice about injustice, but rejoices when truth wins out. it never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

martha’s love didn’t exactly exhibit 1 corinthians 13. when love becomes holding on - whether to a person or to your idea of what something should be - instead of letting go, it ceases being love as God defines it. loving deeply isn’t wrong. it just needs to be defined the right way.