Quotes from Today's Reading

The Divine Drama of Love

In this Divine Drama, God is indeed the playwright and the director, but more importantly He is the lead actor. He is the Hero of the story.

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In fact, Love demands and necessitates the otherness of the Trinity! God could not have been LOVE prior to the creation of others, unless He was plurality, unless there was otherness in the oneness.

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The philosophical discussion of creation ex nihilo, out of nothing,doesn't play well in the drama. All one gets from nothing is nothing. Creation is ek theos, out of God, for He is the source and origin of all things.

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The issue in this first creative stage of the drama is not things anyway. The material realm is just the "stage" for the drama. It becomes a theatre of the absurd when those who are supposed to participate in the drama spend all their time arguing about how the stage was built. It is really a sad phenomena when some choose to deify the stage by seeking to protect and idolize the physical environment.

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John Milton, in his classic of English Literature, Paradise Lost, captures the imagery of the great betrayal of God's Love.

Author of evil, unknown till thy revolt ...
How hast thou disturbed
Heaven's blessed peace, and unto Nature brought
Misery, uncreated till the crime
Of thy rebellion. How hast thou instilled
Thy malice into thousands, once upright
And faithful, now proved false ...
Heaven casts thee out.

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God created Adam and Eve to participate in His love in a manner in which no other part of the created order was capable of participating. As sort of a wedding present, God placed original mankind in a perfect garden, and encouraged them to "Enjoy. Eat freely ... with a singular exception."

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There is such freedom in true love! Genuine love is not controlling or manipulative. It allows the other person to be what they were intended to be. But in that freedom is the risk that love might be rejected.

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God IS Love, and He cannot cease to be God. He cannot cease to be Love, or to act in Love. He had intimated to the first couple in the garden that He would come back for them - a Messianic promise (3:15). A promise He renewed throughout the old covenant.