Love Is Bigger

As I write this morning I am looking out the window of an airplane, and marveling at what is shaping up to be a spectacular sunrise.

It’s marvelous that I am tens of thousands of feet in the air, gazing out the window at rose colored clouds and soft orange and yellow beans of sunlight bursting through, and I’m also online writing this devotion.

What a world, am I right?

While I am reflecting on all of these marvelous things,  I am also listening to one of my favorite albums from 2017–U2’s Songs Of Experience.  One of the songs, “Love Is Bigger Than Anything It’s Way,” is really speaking to me this morning. 

If I could, I would come, too
But the path is made by you
As you’re walking start singing and stop talking. 

Oh, if I could hear myself when I say 
(Oh love) love is bigger than anything in its way. 

For some reason those words, combined with the sunrise and the overwhelming feeling that I am being drawn into something bigger, something greater than myself as I’m hurtling along at breakneck speed, high in the air, but still tethered to the earth, connected to people who are reading, listening and wondering just like me... all of it makes me feel both terrified and hopeful. 

I imagine Jesus speaking to the lyrics of the song to his disciples before he disappears from their view.  “If I could, I would come, too... As you’re walking start singing and stop talking.”  And then the realization of the disciples comes after hearing Jesus speak: “...love is bigger than anything in its way.”  

Whatever is before us, Beloved—we can  know without a shadow of a doubt that because of Jesus, love is bigger.  We are making the road before us by walking—stepping forward in faith and trust.  And we sing our songs of hope even as it seems the world has gone crazy at times and even when we are afraid.  

Because the God who paints the sky with breathtaking artistry, is the same God who gave Godself sacrifically and with love that is hard to comprehend—love that is bigger than anything in its way. 

May the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you now and always. Amen.