Because Iron Sharpens Iron

the battle between love and pride

The maple tree in our backyard was blazing red last week, its brilliant leaves hanging like delicate, tired flames.

Now, as they fall, the garden floor bears a circle of red. It is gorgeous, though uncomfortable to witness, the bright dying of beauty to make even more.

Love is like that—hanging on and letting go, dedicating oneself to believing there is good coming, even if something has to die first for beauty to be born again.

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It is mid-week as I write this, and I lift my face to the sun as I walk. Justin is close, this partner who pushes me toward love more than anyone I know.

And it is good, though challenging. 

Love offers everything beautiful and tears your heart until surrender comes.

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“Iron sharpens iron,” (Proverbs 27:17). Justin reminds me. He can tell when I’m stuck and don’t know my way out. He does the tremendously difficult dance of pursuing me and giving me room.

I am grateful.

In relationships, we hurt each other when we let ourselves get in the way. We may want to be where the light shines, but when we hear words we don’t want to hear—true or not—it is so hard not to have our hearts harden. It is hard not to be stubborn. It is hard not to care mostly about being right.

This clashing of wills, this battle for more than peace, is a lot of work. I have been married for twenty-eight years and know now that fighting for another person’s heart doesn’t always mean turning the other way, hoping for the best, and not doing a thing. When we see someone we love turning away from God and rejecting the full life He has for them, it will do no one any good to do nothing. 

Because I am stubborn and prideful, I often choose self-preservation rather than love, forgetting that dying to self is the only way to let love in. So, I ask God to soften my heart. I ask Him to help me cooperate with Him as He does the miracle work of love in me. I say yes to turbulence, to storm, if that is what it takes to save me from drowning. 

Love might be leaning into the unknown of aging, an attitude of hope amid sickness, weakness and trials. Love might be being honest with friends and telling them we are not okay. Love might be being bold, letting God’s words be more than words but action. Love might be the act of listening—but also the choice to respond to what the Holy Spirit is whispering right now to our hearts. 

It doesn’t take being married to know that, as humans, it is our job to love. Love is heartbreak and hope. Love is battle and surrender. Love isn’t always as pretty as a sun-kissed maple shedding leaves into bouquets below.

Love’s beauty is true and worth it and better.

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Sunday Afternoon

We sit outside on blue picnic benches,
feet in the dirt under
an umbrella-ed patio
drinking pints of beer and writing with
AirPods in our ears.
We wear our reading glasses,
your two-toned brown and blue,
mine black, and it is a memory tucked away
that reminds me
of our dreams to compete
and achieve and
measure ourselves by
happiness that comes
with the kind of success
you can hold in
your hands rather than
the kind I ache to describe to you now,
a bumbling falling and knowing
less in my head
and more in my heart
to conceive
anything is possible.

(from The Uncovering)