Love

Frederick Buechner died on Monday, and Stephanie and I celebrated our 36th wedding anniversary on Tuesday. That’s something of a non sequitur, I believe. At first glance — even at a second or third glance — our anniversary has no logical connection with the death of the novelist, memoirist, theologian and Presbyterian preacher.

Except this: I heard of Buechner’s death on our anniversary while I was reading his thoughts on marriage. While my life with Stephanie has taught me more about the meaning of love than I could have possibly imagined on August 16, 1986, it is Buechner who has given me the words to describe it.

Culturally, we think of love as an emotion, as something we feel, “love as a response of the heart to loveliness,” as Buechner describes it. But when we share life deeply with someone, we know this doesn’t begin to define the true depth of our experience. In The Hungering Dark, Buechner writes that love is much more than an emotion. It is an act of the will.

The promises that are given [in marriage] are not just promises to love the other when the other is lovely and lovable, but to love the other for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, and that means to love the other even at half-past three in the morning when the baby is crying and to love each other with a terrible cold in the head and when the bills have to be paid. The love that is affirmed at a wedding is not just a condition of the heart but an act of the will, and the promise that love makes is to will the other's good even at the expense sometimes of its own good — and that is quite a promise.

What does the couple get in return for this promise? Buechner answers this question in another book, Whistling in the Dark.

They get each other in return. Assuming they have any success at all in keeping their rash, quixotic promises, they never have to face the world quite alone again. There will always be the other to talk to, to listen to. If they're lucky, even after the first passion passes, they still have a kindness and a patience to depend on, a chance to be patient and kind. There is still someone to get through the night with, to wake into the new day beside.

This love is not restricted to married couples. Siblings, friends, neighbors, chosen family. If we have people who show up for us when life is hard and celebrate with us when life is good, we know what it is to receive this love. If we have people for whom we show up to console in tough times and to rejoice in good times, we know what it is to give this love. To have even one relationship like this is a blessing. To have two or three is an abundance.

Buechner’s thoughts on love echo the 13th chapter of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. While this may be an overused scripture passage at weddings, the message is worth remembering. Because it’s not marriage about which Paul is writing but all relationships. This is the love God gives us in Christ. It is the love we are called to share with others.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. (1 Cor 13:4-8a)