Brotherly Love
Then they [Jonathan and David] kissed each other and wept together - but David wept the most. (1 Samuel 20:41).
Then they [Jonathan and David] kissed each other and wept together - but David wept the most. (1 Samuel 20:41).
The Bible teaches in a variety of ways. It contains stories - both non-fiction and fiction, personal and general letters, rules, prophecy, poetry, and proverbs. Because it is written in the way it is, we are forced to ponder over what it says. It is through careful thought that we discover its great riches of wisdom. But because of the way many of its stories are written, they are vulnerable to misinterpretation and abuse. However, it is this same vulnerability that makes it so wonderfully effective in how it touches our areas of need.
One story that has been sadly abused is that of Jonathan and David. Jonathan was the eldest son of Israel's first king, Saul. Jonathan would have been the heir to the throne had it not been for his father's disobedience to God. As a result, but known only to a few, David was chosen by God to be Saul's successor instead of Jonathan. Still, Jonathan and David were best friends.
The intensity of their love and affection for one another has led some people to surmise that there was a romantic component involved. A reference used to support this view is found in David's lament over Jonathan's death in battle:
I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother; you were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women. (1 Samuel 1:26)
To draw such a conclusion regarding the friendship of these two men, reveals what I believe is one of the greatest tragedies of our day. To conclude that the intensity of love between Jonathan and David necessitates a romantic component, shows that we have lost any understanding of the validity and reality of true brotherly love.
Jonathan and David should be a model of the kind of love that is possible between two men. I want to focus on male relationships for two reasons. First, intense love between men is very different from a similar love shared between two women. Second, this kind of relationship between two males is very rare today.
The relationship between Jonathan and David demonstrates the reality of the kind of heart connection that can exist between two men. We were made for relationship - close relationship. Our individualistic society chokes life out of us. We actually need one another far more than most of us would admit.
Because, in our day, love is equated with romance, we don't know how to deal with feelings of love and affection for one another. Since many men are taught to suppress and not trust these kinds of feelings, when we have them - which most of us do at some point - we may not know how to express them appropriately.
No matter what we think about these things and no matter how we deal with our emotions, men are made for intimate, non-romantic, relationships with other men. Our hearts cry out for brothers in whom we can confide, with whom we can work alongside, for brothers who can encourage one another.
I wonder how many relationships between men have never come to fruition due to fear and our inability to understand the dynamics of male to male love.
In our day we have an additional obstacle. Should we discover in ourselves a heart of love for another person similar to that of Jonathan and David, we might resist the desire to walk out that relationship, because we don't want it to be misconstrued as romantic.
But are we going to allow the warped perspective of a lost culture to determine how we are going to live, or will we align ourselves with God's perspective as revealed in the Scriptures? May God help us to rediscover the reality of brotherly love.
5 comments:
Then G-d said "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness ...
We are created to be in love relationships just as G-d the father loves G-d the Son and G-d the Holy Spirit. We as men are to be deeply in love with G-d,our wives our children our brothers in Yeshua. As christian men we so often fail in these relationships perhaps because we do not comprehend his love for us in the first place.
Now that does speak to me. I have often felt the need of such a person. The longing to share of oneself fully seems to be built in.
So how do you build this type of closeness? We are so disconnected,so independant. I have often thought that G-d wishes that we would demonstrate this love for our brothers so that the world could see and desire it. I have often thought that G-d wishes to put back together the Jewish and Gentile believers as a community so that others would see and desire it. So much was lost when the church and synagogue split.
It is interesting that you would relate the lack of intimate personal relationships with the beiger issue of disunity among believers in general. Certainly our sense of independence is both a corporate as well as individual thing.
When you refer to what "was lost when the church and synagogue split", I would like to point out that the split was between Jewish and Gentile believers not the two institutions of church and synagogue.
I am a 42 year old man, happily married for 20 years with two teenage daughers. Unfortuantely I have spent most of this time void of any real friendship with men. Until this year. I decided it was important, needed and necessary for me. I actively put feet (joining a fire dept) and prayer to my words and desire for friends and God has answered. I have a best friend for the first time in over 20 years. I will be honest...my feelings of love for my brother has freaked me out a little - its intense and deep. But I refuse to let it be seen as anything other than what this article describes. There is no desire to jump in the bed with him but only to go deeper in our understanding, repsect, and love for eachother. I'm sick and tired of living in isolation from other men for fear it will look or be thought of as gay. Who cares really. It's one of the greatest joys of my life right now. I thank God for it.
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