A fine-looking collegian came to my office in personal distress. He had talked to me before so went directly to his concern on this day. His heart, mind and spirit were full of troubled contradictions, of confused meanings and values. He doubted if he was loved by his pastor, by his teachers, even by me in whom he had confided earlier. He asked: Have any of you shown your love for me? His vocal inflection was highly accusative. I asked what evidence he looked for relative to love, and he did not immediately answer. He quickly shifted to other issues. My question interposed again. I was loath to let it go. At last he said that if we loved him we would trust him by not having any rules in the college that would limit his personal choices of time schedules, or to place on him any personal controls. He admitted that the rules were not extensive but the existence of even one limitation made him rabid with anger. I admitted that it is possible that some rules may be onerous, some even useless, but they did not admit of withheld love. They were created, correctly or incorrectly, as means for conducting the business of an institution and to maintain at least a semblance of some values in which the institution is interested. I insisted on a better selection of evidence that he was unloved – for he had included persons in his accusations having nothing to do with the evidence he presented, as was his pastor. Whatever he disliked in his relationships was taken as a lack of love on the part of the other person. He seemed oblivious to examining his own love quotients. Could he love persons he seemed to fault?
At last I asked him if he did not once tell me that he believed that those who loved him gave time to listen and talk to him in patience. I noted that I was busy; but so taken up with his concerns for an hour and a half that I was not, until this moment, aware of time. My wife was holding dinner for me. During that period my mind had not run from his concern to my own or some other. I was surprised that so much time had elapsed. He acknowledged that the time had been given cheerfully, and not because of any implication of duty. I yearned to find the combination which would help us unlock his distress, a distress that was no less distress because it was the residue of his imaginings leading to ranting. He permitted a tear to fall, and we prayed.
We did not talk again of these matters during the rest of his college career. Six or so years after his graduation, I was scheduled to speak to a conference near Portland, Oregon. To my surprise, my red-headed friend was waiting for me. He had requested the host that he might be permitted to pick me up at the airport. From there, for the miles to our destination, he talked about our long ago conversation, how much he appreciated it, and that it awakened him to his tendency to interpret others negatively, and to permit every slight or contradiction of his own feelings to be evidence of disregard, more negative than it could possibly be. There were other factors we discussed, but the fact that he had turned his attention from love by others to his own need to love was quite enough for us. He was eager to have me think well of him. I assured him, but I wanted him to know that I had not thought less of him when he was wrestling through the jungle of life’s distractions. Indicative of his response was that he knew he was loved when he had returned little love. This context is especially tragic when it occurs in families, between parents and children, between mother and father, between other relatives. The context is much too common, and visits effects on millions of persons so to take from life, and give to life, one of the evidences of God – love and how to practice it. We repeat often that love is in the nature of God, a part of his image given to us in creation. Why in all that is holy, do some of us pass it by? *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020