Second Sunday of Advent: A Home for Love

Kodak Instamatic 233-X from threepointsofthecompass

Reflections from my book, 
Home for Christmas: Youth Study Edition

Unfortunately, I don’t remember many specific Christmas seasons. I don’t remember many specific church services, Christmas parties, shopping excursions, or holiday concerts. I don’t remember many Christmas mornings.

But I remember one. It was my first year of college. I had gone away for school, and was fortunate enough to come home for Christmas. It was a great time to see old friends, to be with my family, to visit my old church, and even to sing again in the church choir. There wasn’t much of the material stuff that I was thinking about, but I was hoping my parents would be able to buy me a camera for Christmas. There were no smartphones then, and I wanted to document my college experience. Christmas day came, and after I opened a few small gifts, which did not disappoint me, my parents said, “We have one more thing for you.” “Let it be a camera, let it be a camera,” I thought. The box was too big for a camera, but you know that trick about wrapping smaller gifts in big boxes. I opened the box. It was a television. Apparently, I had talked so much about the tv that my roommate had in our tiny room, that my parents, who knew I would be moving to another room, thought a television was what I wanted. I wasn’t sure how to respond. I felt loved that my parents were trying to read my mind, and I felt unloved because they read wrong. I said, “Thank you.” And Dad said, “You don’t look very happy.” I tried to explain the expression on my face. My loving parents were understanding, and we returned the TV for a camera.

The gift of my parent’s love (even when it doesn’t deliver what I hoped it would) is, well, a precious gift. And too many people are not as fortunate as I am.

In the Bible, we learn a lot about love from Jonathan, his father, Saul, and Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth. Maybe you have heard about Mephibosheth, maybe you haven’t. Some would say he had a good life…at least in the beginning. His grandfather, Saul, had been king. And although Mephibosheth’s dad, Jonathan, never got to be king,  Jonathan was lifelong best friends with the next monarch, King David.

The Bible talks a lot about Jonathan and David’s friendship. They made vows to each other when they were young. 1 Samuel says that “Jonathan loved David as much as himself.” (1 Samuel 18:3 CEB)

Jonathan proved that love over and over, especially when Jonathan’s dad was trying to kill David. According to the Bible, Jonathan’s dad was so jealous of David that he was continually trying to kill David. Jonathan first started warning David, then started hiding him, and then started hiding WITH him. Jonathan was in such a risky situation that his dad even tried to kill HIM. So as Jonathan showed his love for his friend, David, he was also living through the lack of love from his own father.

Eventually both Jonathan and his dad were killed in a battle. By that time Jonathan had children of his own. His son, Mephibosheth, was 5 years old when his father and grandfather were killed. David had become king, and now it was his turn to prove that he understood how to love. He remembered his vow to Jonathan. He wanted that vow to continue to the next generation, so he invited the young Mephibosheth to live in his home. They became family even though they were not blood. They were kin.

Father Boyle likes to talk about radical kinship. At Homeboy, they practice that kinship every day. Person after person talks about the love they have found in their Homeboy family. Truth be told, many had already experienced a kind of family in their gangs. But unlike Jonathan, who would die for his “homie,” the gangbangers were more likely to kill for the gang. Here at Homeboy, they are practicing the power of love.

In some ways, the holiday season is the worst time to think about love. Too often we measure love by material things we have hope to be given or by whether certain people remembered us. That one Christmas day that I remember left me confused about my parents’ love. It shouldn’t have. They had showed it in so many ways, even in their attempt to give me the perfect gift.

I have since learned a lot about love. Maybe not enough. But enough to focus more on my loving than my being loved. This is what King David did. When his best friend died, his first question was, “Is there anyone left in Jonathan’s family that I can show kindness to? How can I demonstrate my continued love for my friend? And how can I make a difference in someone’s life?”

Martin Luther King, Jr. once said “We must discover the power of love,

the redemptive power of love. And when we discover that, we will be able to make of this old world a new world. Love is the only way.”

At Homeboy, old rivalries die, as they practice kinship—as they work together, pray together, learn together, and laugh together. They bear one another’s burdens. And they experience love when they share love.