Following Rules Is Not The Path To Love

​Yesterday, I wrote about New England Patriot's coach Mike Vrabel, and how he made connection with his team a priority in his coaching style. I wrote he does that because that is what each of us requires - longs for - relationship.

I thought about that deeper yesterday in terms of Jesus - and Christianity. There's an old saying - a cliche' of sorts - that says 'Christianity is not a religion, it's a relationship'. What that is saying is the heart of Christianity is not about cleaning up your act, it's about drawing closer to the one who gave you your act to begin with.

It's about loving the one who gave the rules so deeply that rules feel more like a path to love than mandates that begin to feel like the price of love.

And this is how Christianity often gets distorted into something transactional:

“If I do this, God will do that.”

“If I behave, God will bless.”

“If I fail, God will punish.”

That’s not relationship. That’s spiritual management.

As someone who has experienced a failed marriage, I started thinking of this spiritual management in terms of marital management. How you can be committed to following every rule of marriage and still land in an emotional desert. How if you don't wake up every day centered on growing and nurturing the love in the connection, the rules of the connection can become quickly meaningless.

Behaving like a happily married couple doesn't always mean there is happy love between the couple.

And I think of it in terms of fatherhood. How a dad can raise children to fully understand the rules of a home so strongly that the child's greatest desire becomes leaving that home. It's easy for parenting to become about establishing and enforcing rules at the expense of not growing a connection.

Rules will never bring a child back home; connection will make it impossible for them to stay away.

I think that's what Jesus longs for - a connection that makes it impossible for us to stay away. And too often, it's breaking the 'rules and commandments' of Christianity that leaves folks believing they are unworthy of a connection with Jesus.

That's a completely upside down understanding of Jesus, and a repellent to those longing for a connection with something bigger than themselves.

Jesus came to help us understand that following rules is not the path to him, but rather, loving him is the path to following the rules. Jesus love is built on accepting that he came to love the flawed rule breakers, not the folks who believed they could become flawless enough to earn his love.

Following rules is rarely the path to a loving connection, but a loving connection is often a path to longing for guardrails and rules that will protect that connection.

Memorizing the rules of love will leave you in a constant pursuit of love. Getting to know someone - a never ending desire to do so - that is the path to love.

That, is the ONLY path.