When is it ok, safe, good to give up on love?

My first response is, “NEVER!”

It may be more complicated than that.

I have been through abuse.  I have seen its ugly hand at work in the lives of children, spouses, schools.  I have seen, up close, the despair, the fear, the monumental rage that it creates.

I have seen infidelity, been through it on both sides at some level.  I have known betrayal and that feeling of lostness that accompanies those acts.  “Will no one love me?” I have watched as lives are destroyed by thoughtless fathers who simply move on, leaving the bruised and broken in their wake.

I have seen neglect.  The parents who have checked out, through booze, porn, religion, TV, whatever.  They just aren’t there anymore.  They just don’t care enough to get off their lazy asses and be a part of something greater, something bigger, something alive.  And so they live in houses where everyone is alone, everyone is confused, everyone feels so unloved.

I would want all these scenarios to not exist, to never occur.  I would want to make it so that no child, no wife, no person ever has to go through things like this.

God wants that too.  He saw it coming and sent His son to make a way for healing and wholeness to be restored.  He seems to never give up on me even when I can’t do anything right.  He seems to constantly love me, even when I am totally unlovable.

And for the issues, the horrible problems that I brushed over today, He gave a solution.  His forgiveness of my sin, of your sin, makes it possible for us to do the impossible.

LOVE!

When is it ok, safe, good to give up on love?

Yeah, my first response was the right one.