THE PURE LOVE

 

I became convinced over the years that the pure love of Christ is a unique love to the Saviour and that we do not have an ability to develop this love no matter how hard we try. Moroni attests to this by saying that charity, or the pure love of Christ, is an endowment bestowed upon ‘all who are true followers of Jesus Christ’ (Moroni 7:48).

The pure love of Christ is therefore a gift, like many godly attributes that are bestowed upon us due to our righteousness but our inability to develop them ourselves…..except for one thing. None of these attributes come to us in the abstract. They are given through clinical experiences of mortality.

Elder Bruce C. Hafen discussed this very doctrine in preparing his biography of Elder Neal A. Maxwell. He talked at length about Elder Maxwell’s theory of “wintry doctrine” as opposed to what he called “warm and cuddly doctrines of the gospel”. The “wintry doctrine” was in his mind his belief that Jesus “will eventually request each of us to do those very things which are most difficult for us to do.” (Elder Bruce C. Hafen, “The Story of a Disciple’s Life: Preparing the Biography of Elder Neal A. Maxwell)

After Elder Maxwell was called to the Twelve, “he began to see discipleship as a personal growth process designed to develop Christlike attributes”. In 1996 that personal growth of discipleship became a reality as leukemia entered his life and taught him through suffering of Christ’s empathy for us. He began to experience the pure love that Christ has for other people. This is the doctrinal link that Elder Hafen gleaned from Elder Maxwell’s experience:

“Perhaps those who seek apprenticeship with the Master of mankind must emulate his sacrificial experience to the fullest extent of their personal capacity…. Only then are they like Him enough to feel His love for others THE WAY HE FEELS IT – to love, “AS I HAVE LOVED YOU” (John 13:34). That is a deeper, different love from “love thy neighbour as thyself.”  (Matthew 19:19)

“His love for all mankind is fully bound up in His exquisite pain…..Perhaps we cannot know His love without knowing His pain. If so, the personal suffering we confront…could move the pure love of Christ from a concept in one’s head to a substance in one’s heart. And once in the heart, charity will circulate all through the body, because it is being moved by “a new heart”. (Elder Bruce C. Hafen, “Preparing the Biography of Elder Neal A. Maxwell)

To have this unique love of Christ take its place in our hearts is worth all the suffering we as mortals can endure…it is priceless…

I stand in awe of Him who possesses this love…..the greatness is beyond my limited mind.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

(Art: With All My Heart by Yongsung Kim)