If the first thing about committing the will is that it is a death to yourself, what comes to life is a disposition that seeks to serve. The one who serves does so with kindness and gentleness. This is something we almost never think of anymore, that we are called to the service of love.We are so prone to lay claim to our rights that we bury the demand that calls us to serve. Our love story shows us in a simple act the beauty of service that has at its heart a kind spirit.
Rebekah emerges to me as a lovely woman. I doubt you and I have ever given much thought to how much a camel drinks. I suspect it would have been a significant time commitment to give just one camel its load of drink for the day. This young woman said, “You rest awhile, sir. I’ll not only give you the water, I will take care of your camels, too—all ten of them.” The thoughtfulness and kindness she demonstrated are exemplary. Her actions could not have been typical because they served as a sign to Eliezer.
One of the privileges of traveling and visiting different cultures is the opportunity of entering different homes—and observing much. One impression of any relationship that stands out and is remembered is the level of kindness or unkindness demonstrated between a husband and wife. The first is refreshing; the latter is discomforting. I would go so far as to say that there is never a reason to be unkind. There may be reasons to disagree. There may be reasons to struggle.After all, two wills are merging into one. There are constant compromises and surrenders demanded, but there is never a reason to be unkind, particularly when you are tampering with the very fragile nature of a person’s sensitivities. I have seen love maimed and even killed by unkind words. Unkindness can be the hatpin to the heart of love and bleed it to death. Lives and dispositions are much more fragile than we think. Every relationship should be marked “Fragile: Handle with Care.”
In our marriage I have prayed constantly that God will so fill Margie and me with His presence that even in some of the difficult moments we may have to work through, we may be able to resist the temptation to be rude or unkind to each other. I like to use the term cherishing your partner. That word comes from the French verb chérir, which means to hold dear or endear to yourself, to care for tenderly, to esteem or consider a person costly by your treatment of him or her.What you cherish, you hold close to you; what you hold closely, you protect; what you protect, you have. “To have and to hold” can be reversed to say “to hold and to have.” This is very much rooted in the very terms God uses of His own kindness to His people.
From the time the story begins, there are two themes repeated with frequency. The first is the covenantal term for God’s love, His hesed or “loving-kindness.” Hesed is the unmerited and generous favor of God. It is a love that is gentle and always reaching out to the object of that love. This is the protection that Abraham experienced as God reached out to him, and this loving-kindness from God caused him to serve others. This loving-kindness is exemplified in the way Isaac received his bride-to-be.
Old Testament scholar Daniel Block describes hesed as “that quality that moves a person to act for the benefit of another without respect to the advantage that it might bring to the one who expresses it. . . . [This] quality is expressed fundamentally in action rather than word or emotion.”1 That is very well put. It is an attribute that puts the other first and is defined by action rather than by emotion. It is interesting that in English we must put two words together in order to get the concept of the one word hesed—loving-kindness.
You may recall that in the Greek language there are four words for the English word love—agape, meaning a love that is pure enough to be used even of God; phileo, the love of friendship; storge, protective love, best described as the love of a parent for a child; and eros, romantic love. Marriage is the only relationship that blends all four loves. But it all has to begin with that loving-kindness, in the Old Testament intimated by the Hebrew word hesed. It is a term culturally laden with historic memory and collective hope. It is this love that has brought us this far and will carry us further. In the Old Testament God continually reminds His people of His hesed. It is the waiting and overflowing love that the prodigal son knew when he returned home and that the older son had forgotten by taking it for granted.
The Psalmist said, “Your love [“loving-kindness” in the King James Version] is better than life” (Psalm 63:3). One wonders how God’s loving-kindness can be better than life when without life you cannot enjoy His loving-kindness. But the truth is that without God’s loving-kindness, life is not worth living. In fact, that is precisely what David says as he begins Psalm 63:
O God, you are my God,
earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land
where there is no water. . . .
Because your [loving-kindness] is better than life,
my lips will glorify you. (vv. 1, 3)
Parched lips do not sing, but a life that is full of love and refreshment does sing. Isaac and Rebekah had both experienced this hesed, this loving-kindness, and now in their meeting they knew it again. The Scriptures say ever so briefly but ever so pointedly of their meeting, “. . . he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her” (Genesis 24:67). It is interesting to notice the sequence. We would have said he loved her and so she became his wife. Instead, the Scriptures tell us, “She became his wife, and he loved her.”
Only a few verses later we are given a small glimpse into Isaac and Rebekah’s private life when they were in another town and were unaware that they were being watched. The Bible says, “Abimelech . . . looked down from a window and saw Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah” (Genesis 26:8). That alone speaks volumes of his tenderness and affection toward her. In fact, the greatest compliment he paid her is given to us several years after they were married, when Isaac sent for their son Jacob, who was of marriageable age, and told him to go back to the family and home of Rebekah and look for a wife from within their extended family (see Genesis 28:1–2). That plea to his son lets us know that Isaac was certain he had done the right thing in marrying Rebekah, and it is a reminder again that the family from which one comes has great influence.
Translated into the daily routine it means this: There will be times in the relationship between a husband and wife when one says, “I’m feeling very unhappy, and I really can’t even tell you what the reason is. All I know is that I need to be loved.” There are times when no amount of talk, no explanation or solution to a situation can take the place of just being held in the arms of the person you love, of feeling loved and cared for. It’s that kind of kindness, I think, that is able to walk the second mile.
Do you remember Jesus’s illustration on that? In Jesus’s time, the Roman yoke was literally and figuratively heavy upon the Jewish shoulder. The Jews resented the Romans for their power, their dominance, and their bullying of the Jewish people. They wanted a Messiah who would not only throw off the Roman yoke but would even bring tremendously punitive measures upon the Roman monarchy.
We can imagine a young Jewish man coming to Jesus one day and saying something like this: “The law in our land says that if a Roman soldier comes to me and asks me to carry his heavy arms and ammunition for him, I, as a Jew, must stop whatever else I am doing and walk with him one mile, carrying his burden. The next time he comes to me and demands that I carry his arms and ammunition just because I am a Jew, what should I say to him?”
Of course, the man was really hoping for some kind of answer that would encourage him to resist such domination. But Jesus looked at him and said, “The next time he comes and asks you to walk with him one mile, at the end of the one mile pause and look into his eyes and say to him, ‘Sir, would you mind if I carry it a second mile, also?’” (see Matthew 5:41). The counterperspective of Jesus Christ constantly left His questioners speechless because He moved love to its loftiest plane.
This principle is put to test early in the simpler things of life. May I illustrate one of those? I learned soon after being married that there is an unwritten law that says it is always the responsibility of the man of the house to carry out the garbage. I don’t know where this idea came from, but no matter whose home you are in, it’s always the man who takes out the garbage.
When we lived in Chicago during my days at graduate school, the garbage dump was at least fifty yards from our apartment. Chicago, of course, can get pretty windy and icy. It didn’t seem to matter what the hour was, every time I went out of our apartment, my wife was always at the door to kiss me good-bye, which was fine. But it seemed that she always had a bag of garbage to hand me, even if I was headed out on a Friday night to begin a two-hundred-mile trip to preach.
What would you do? Like me, you would probably want to grab the garbage bag and say, “Here, give it to me!” Then muttering to yourself about the cruelty of life, you would go over to the garbage dump and jam the bag into the drums while the cats and dogs are pouncing all over the place; get into the car and slam the door, start the engine, and squeal the tires as you pull out of there; pull into the church parking lot, hurriedly put on your “Praise the Lord” face, stand behind the pulpit, and say,“Isn’t it wonderful to be serving the Lord so willingly?”
No, no! That isn’t what you do! Instead, you take the garbage bag ever so gently, so you don’t hurt either her or the garbage. You take it in both arms as you slide across that miserable ice, whistling, “Everything is beautiful in its own way.” Drop it into the drum very carefully. End of mile one!
Then you go back into your apartment—make sure she doesn’t have a coronary now—and say, “Honey, I still have ten minutes to go. Would you like me to help you with the dishes before I leave?”
As far-fetched as that sounds, it is the coinage with which you make your investment of cherishing and caring. I do not know what mileage you have been asked to walk with your partner, but I have no doubt there is another mile you will still need to walk when things get tough. The Scriptures remind us, “Love is patient, love is kind” (1 Corinthians 13:4), and we should “consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24).
To the young woman I say, This is the moment in your life when he who is wooing you will be at his kindest. And if you do not see kindness in the man you are dating, beware! For the partnership you are looking for will be nourished and nurtured only on the basis of a love that is not arrogant or prideful, but kind.
There is a remote story in 1 Samuel, chapter 25, tucked in the middle of David’s history. It begins as a touching episode but tapers off into disappointment for the ones involved. David is a young man at this time, fresh from gallant victories on the battlefield. Observing the need for some replenishment for his troops, he sends his soldiers to the home of a wealthy man named Nabal, who is married to a lovely young woman named Abigail.
David’s message to Nabal is a plea. He reminds him that he has taken good care of his farmers during the war, and but for that protection, Nabal’s wealth would have been plundered by the enemy. “Would you consider giving a love-offering to help feed my soldiers for the care they have given you?” asks David. No amount is stipulated; he just presents a fair request. But Nabal flatly turns down David’s request, basically referring to him as a young “upstart” who credited himself with too much. David is angry at Nabal’s response, perhaps justifiably, and decides to show Nabal who the real “upstart” is.
Up to this point in the story we have seen only the soldiers, David, and Nabal. But now there enters a unique woman, Abigail, Nabal’s wife. She is informed of what has happened and could easily have said, “It serves my husband right for being such an idiot.” But she doesn’t play that game. Even though her husband does not merit her dignity and love, she does the honorable thing. She saddles up her donkeys with food and other goods and goes out to meet David, who is on his way to make short work of Nabal.When she comes face to face with David, she gives him a speech of a lifetime that goes something like this: “My husband’s name is Nabal, and Nabal means ‘fool.’ Unfortunately, he has lived that way much of his life. But today, David, there is a bigger fool in the land, and that fool is you. You are planning to kill a man, but in doing so you will bring murder upon your own head. That will rob you of the enrichment with which God wants to bless you some day. Don’t do it, David. Take what you please, but spare my husband.”
David is absolutely silenced by Abigail’s charm and wisdom. He tells her she can go on her way. She has accomplished her mission, and he will not harm Nabal.
One would think that was the end of the story. But unfortunately, it isn’t. Impressed with Abigail’s courage, wisdom, and poise, David was unable to get her out of his mind. She was an outstanding woman. As time went by, David heard that Nabal had died. His first thought was, Aha! Abigail a widow! Maybe Ican propose marriage to her. And that is precisely what happened. She agreed and he married her.
But nothing is ever heard of Abigail again. It is as if he saw, he conquered . . . and that was it. The Scriptures go on to remind us of David’s many wives and of his huge family in which sensuality reached incredible proportions. David knew how to be attracted to a woman, how to recognize commitment, and how to be impressed with devotion. But he just did not know how to cherish and follow through on that which had first attracted him. Once he had Abigail, he forgot about her and was on to the next challenge. And in the end, it wreaked havoc upon the entire nation.
Some time ago, I was speaking at the hundredth anniversary celebration of a hospital in the country of Bahrain, founded by the famed missionary Samuel Zwemer. Here at this hospital, over the years, thousands have been treated and shown the love of Jesus Christ. Lives have been brought to birth, and the critically ill have been treated. Pain has been alleviated. And on that occasion we were reminded of the ministry that had taken place at the hospital over one hundred years. But what was most gripping to me during the evening and the walk down memory lane were the words written by Zwemer in tribute to his wife. Put to music by a young Indian woman, they were sung to us beautifully that night. The audience was deeply touched by the words.
Her love was like an island
In life’s ocean, vast and wide,
A peaceful, quiet shelter
From the wind and rain and tide.
’Twas bound on the north by hope,
By patience on the west,
By tender counsel on the south
And on the east, by rest.
Above it, like a beacon light,
Shone faith and truth and prayer;
And through the changing scenes of life
I found a haven there.2
You see, being able to reach out with love to the masses would have meant little if there had not been a tender heart at home, as well. The song rightly merited the sense of warmth felt by every heart in the room because it spoke of the strength of a love that was kind, a love that gave a haven to a man who served human kind with that same love.
That is how a marriage should be in its depth within and its reach without. It is not at all surprising that the Bible tells us that Rebekah comforted Isaac in the early days of their marriage on the loss of his mother. Kindness is a rare expression, but it is beyond price if the true value of marriage is to be preserved.
Kindness is the touch, the look, the beat of the heart, and the act that seeks to cherish and guard the one to whom you say, “I love you.” The commitment of the will and kindness are components that blend in a lovely mix, making a house a home, a haven of precious memories.