Cracked Hearts and Open Arms
By Bethany Kaldas
‘But love your enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High. For He is kind to the unthankful and evil. Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful.’
Luke 6:35-36
One of the hardest things in life is to love and not be loved in return—or perhaps even worse, to love and be mistreated in return. I’m not mainly speaking in a romantic sense (in fact, to take this in a romantic sense may be quite unwise)—this goes far deeper than that. A parent who does everything he can to show love to his child and yet gets nothing but angst and rebellion and spite in return goes through just as much, if not more, agony as the unrequited lover. A servant may feel the darkest despair when she pours her whole heart and soul out to reach the young girl who is straying from Christ, only to have the girl fight back like she’s the enemy. You may do everything you can to hold on to a dear friend, but sometimes they still walk away.
I’ve heard it said occasionally, within the Church, that it is better to guard your heart against the world, not to love anyone or anything too much, because nothing here lasts. There is some truth to that—though, perhaps, not the way it first seems. But you can see why the idea seems to make sense, right? People quarrel, they leave, they change from being caring to being cold, they can turn against you on the slightest provocation. Even if none of this happens, everyone dies eventually. Even pets, even places, even inanimate objects are unlikely to outlast your affections. You’ll be burned in the end.
The truth is, no matter how much effort you put into a relationship—of any kind—and even if you do everything right, there is no such thing as a safe love. There is a way in which pain and love are inseparable. You must have open arms to love, and it is when your arms are open that you are at your most vulnerable.
So why go through with it? If open arms mean broken hearts, then wouldn’t it be better to always keep your guards up? Why would you ever let anyone in? Who could possibly be worth it?
‘There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.’
C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves
If you live in constant fear of death, you will never live at all. If you only love when you are certain your heart will not be wounded, you will never love at all. Love of any kind is the inevitable risk of being broken apart.
‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces muchgrain.’
John 12:24
A grain doesn’t just need to be buried to live—it also needs to be cracked open. You can’t walk out of a tomb before the stone has been rolled away, no matter how exhausting and painful that process is, no matter how much the sunlight burns your eyes. And it will burn. Love is a leap. Love is a risk.
‘The leap of faith always means loving without expecting to be loved in return, giving without wanting to receive, inviting without hoping to be invited, holding without asking to be held. And every time I make a little leap, I catch a glimpse of the One who runs out to me and invites me into his joy, the joy in which I can find not only myself, but also my brothers and sisters. Thus the disciplines of trust and gratitude reveal the God who searches for me, burning with desire to take away all my resentments and complaints and to let me sit at his side at the heavenly banquet.’
Henri J.M. Nouwen, Return of the Prodigal Son
Love is not safe. Your heart will be broken. But there is One who broke His heart for you first. A Love that shone so bright, not from the safety of a throne as you know it, but hung in agony from a cross, pierced by nails and thorns. His heart broke so that all the cracks in yours, so small by comparison, can shine with the light of His.
Love’s as hard as nails,
C. S. Lewis, Love’s Warm as Tears
Love is nails:
Blunt, thick, hammered through
The medial nerves of One Who, having made us,
Knew The thing He had done,
Seeing what all that is
Our cross, and His
Believe it or not (and people are very unlikely to ever say this to you out loud in actual words) but everyone—even the most stubborn, arrogant, irritating people you know—has a cracked heart. Everyone wants to be loved, even if they don’t always act like they care. Love is never wasted, but they may sting you. When they see the cracks in your heart they might strike. After all, that is what we did to Him.
When you open your heart, when you love knowing it might break you, that is when you see Him. That is when you become like Him. He died, not that you might remain safe in the tomb, but that you might meet Him beyond it. There’s no light in that tomb, no breath, no life. Life awaits you beyond the walls you’ve put around your heart. He awaits you still. For all the cracks you’ve put in His heart, all the nails in His hands, still He awaits you with arms open.
God has given you a heart, and although cracks run through it, however deep, however wide, He has filled it with His love. Let that love shine through the fractures in your own heart to theirs. Show them what it means to be loved regardless. He’s shown you that you’re worth it—take that risk. Show them they are too.
‘We love Him because He first loved us.’
1 John 4:19